Crimea-Ukraine Tensions Rise With Dueling Decrees : Politics: Kravchuk strikes back after president of independence-minded region issues orders on draftees, time zone.

The government and the separatist-minded Crimean region have launched a battle of decrees, and the tit-for-tat volley is causing concern that the paper war could escalate into a real one.

Armed with what he considers a popular mandate to make the Black Sea peninsula independent, Crimean President Yuri Meshkov ordered Crimean draftees in the Ukrainian armed forces to serve their duty on the peninsula. Then he put Crimea on Moscow time, one hour ahead of the rest of Ukraine; defied Kiev by holding a referendum on expanding Crimea’s autonomy as well as his own powers, and fired the Kiev-appointed head of Crimean television, who had refused to give Meshkov’s legislative candidates more than equal time.

After what his critics called too long and tolerant a silence, Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk fired off his own decrees. While the Crimean leader was traveling with his family in Cyprus this week, Kravchuk rescinded Meshkov’s ukase on the draft and reinstated the television executive. He dispatched a trouble-shooter to keep an eye on the increasingly volatile peninsula. Crimean clocks, however, remain on Moscow time.

“Ukraine’s leadership is willing to give the Crimea the widest economic autonomy,” Kravchuk said. “But we will not agree to increasing its military or political powers.”

Returning home Wednesday, Meshkov dismissed the counter-decrees as “political provocations.” One of his aides said Friday, “We will do what we promised.”

Meshkov’s real power is limited. He has no direct control of troops or police--no way to enforce his decrees with muscle. But popular support for independence could work to his advantage. For example, a Ukrainian army that already has trouble conscripting Crimean men might be persuaded to let them serve on the peninsula if the alternative is a higher rate of draft-dodging and desertion.

The Crimean president, elected over a pro-Ukrainian candidate Jan. 30, seems to wield a powerful mandate. Almost 80% of those who took part in his March 27 referendum voted “yes” on a constitutional question that, in effect, declared Crimea independent. Candidates favoring independence and closer ties with Russia led in Crimean legislative elections on the same day.

Although the referendum is not legally binding, Oleksandr Kulyk, editor of the peninsula’s only Ukrainian newspaper, predicts that “within six months, the forces that have seated Meshkov on his throne will use this ‘innocent’ poll to push him into more separatist exploits.”

Other critics point out that because the voter turnout was 60% of those eligible, the 80% of voters who supported independence amount to less than half the Crimean electorate. They say that Meshkov’s radicalism could polarize the peninsula between the urban, Russian-dominated south and the agricultural, Ukrainian-leaning north. “No one wants to be another Yugoslavia, but this is leading to confrontation,” said Vasyl Bohutsky, who also works for the Ukrainian newspaper. “We are all alarmed.”

In the tinderbox of Crimean-Ukrainian relations, even a comedy of errors can have ominous overtones. So when Adm. Eduard Baltin, the Russian commander of the Black Sea Fleet, was shot in the thigh last weekend, Crimea was abuzz with rumors of assassination plots by Ukrainian nationalists. That is, until the fleet’s press office revealed that Baltin’s gun went off accidentally while he was at his dacha.

Then, when a Ukrainian military delegation visited the convalescing admiral in his Crimean hospital room, Russian television reported that Ukraine was beefing up its forces on the peninsula. Taking the report seriously, Meshkov’s chief of staff accused Kiev of trying to block Meshkov’s return from Cyprus.

Meshkov was, indeed, having problems getting home. Turkey refused permission for his chartered flight to cross its airspace. But Ukrainian officials say there was hardly a plot afoot. In his zeal to prove Crimea’s independence, Meshkov ignored the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry and traveled without a proper passport.

Bohutsky, the Ukrainian journalist in Crimea, believes the episode is just a taste of things to come. “Just watch, no matter what goes wrong in Crimea, Meshkov will blame it all on Kiev and Kravchuk,” he said.