West, Russia square off over Ukraine
KIEV—Western powers and Russia squared off over crisishit Ukraine as a top EU envoy prepared to fly to Kiev on Monday to buttress its new leaders’ tilt away from Moscow.
Russia’s fury at the breakneck pace of change in the ex-Soviet nation that saw president Viktor Yanukovych ousted following a week of carnage was on full display with Moscow’s recall of its Kiev ambassador and freeze of its $15-billion Ukrainian bailout loan.
Both the United States and Britain warned Russian President Vladimir Putin not to even consider using force to regain sway over a neighbor he views as vital to his efforts to build an economic—and possibly even military— to theWest.
Ukraine issued an arrest warrant on Monday for Yanukovych over the “mass murder” of protesters and appealed for $35 billion in Western aid to pull the crisis-hit country from the brink of economic collapse.
Acting Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said he held Yanukovych and his team of feared security insiders directly responsible for the deaths.
Ukraine’s new interim leader Oleksandr Turchynov had warned on Sunday that Kiev would have no choice but to default on $13 billion in foreign obligations due this year should the West fail to fill in for Moscow’s suspended aid.
He has until Tuesday to piece together a coalition Cabinet and come up with a prime minister willing to take up the challenge of keeping Ukraine from falling off the economic cliff before new presidential polls are held onMay 25.
Gone are the old interior minister and prosecutor general—both hated figures in the opposition for their roles in ordering police to open fire on protesters—as well as a foreign minister who had guided Ukraine’s path back toward Russia.
Turchynov is a close ally of Yulia Tymoshenko—an iconic but divisive former premier whom parliament on Saturday released from a controversial jail sentence.