Ukrainian Raid Heightens Fleet Dispute With Russia

Russian-Ukrainian relations rose to the boiling point Monday after 120 Ukrainian navy commandos seized a maintenance base of the Black Sea Fleet near Odessa in a late night raid that reportedly injured some Russian sailors and their family members.

The Ukrainian Defense Ministry denied that anyone was hurt when commandos took over the fleet’s 318th Division of reserve ships Sunday night. But it acknowledged that it had moved in to arrest three Black Sea Fleet officers for their role in an incident Saturday that brought Russian and Ukrainian sailors almost to the point of shooting at each other.

Versions of the Odessa events varied, but all sides agreed that the last three days have seen the worst escalation yet of the Russian-Ukrainian tension over control of the Black Sea Fleet.

“The Odessa incident is the most large-scale and daring anti-Russian action ever carried out by Ukraine,” a Russian diplomat in charge of relations with Ukraine told the Interfax news agency. The Russian government demanded the immediate release of the three officers.

Ukraine’s Defense Ministry, for its part, called Russian reports of the arrests “an outrageous and provocative lie.” It said the Russians had been arrested for participating in “piracy” and reported by Monday evening that Ukrainian troops had left the maintenance base, although the three officers remained under arrest.

Breaking up the Black Sea Fleet, which numbers some 300 ships and was once the pride of the Soviet navy, has been fraught with conflict since the Soviet Union’s collapse in late 1991. The Russian and Ukrainian presidents agreed to share control of the fleet for a transitional period, but friction has continued unabated.

The political situation in Crimea, where the fleet is based, adds yet another volatile element. Crimea belongs to Ukraine, but more than half its residents are Russian and separatist sentiment is growing under a new Crimean leader.

Economics also enters the picture. Russia accuses Ukraine of reneging on its obligation to pay for half the upkeep of the Black Sea Fleet, including the basic navigational equipment that regulates sea traffic in Crimean ports.

On Saturday, the financial squabbling turned physical. When some high-ranking Russian officers of the fleet tried to sail the Cheleken, a ship carrying navigational equipment, from Odessa to the fleet’s home base in Sevastopol, they were stopped by Ukrainian navy officers, who claimed the equipment as Ukrainian property.

The confrontation grew so tense that at one point the Russian officers reportedly ordered their men to shoot at the Ukrainians if provoked. The Cheleken ended up sailing to Sevastopol.

The sequel followed late Sunday night, when Ukrainian commandos moved on the maintenance base for reserve ships where the Russian officers from the Cheleken incident were housed.

Accounts differ. The Ukrainian Defense Ministry said that “there was no storming (of the division headquarters) and could not have been.” It said the division was simply blocked off and the officers--one the division commander--were arrested, in part to “prevent further provocations.”

The Russian spokesmen for the Black Sea Fleet said that Ukrainian commandos staged an assault that left glass broken and civilians injured, including children. It said the three Russian officers were led away in handcuffs and that Ukrainians took control of the base’s coastal facilities, communications and weapons.

Ukrainian commandos are also said to have blockaded another Black Sea Fleet division housing navigational equipment.

The Russian navy issued a strident protest, saying the arrests flagrantly violated agreements and “create an explosive situation in the Black Sea Fleet.” The Russian government also protested and demanded that the Russian officers be immediately released.

Tension grew so much that Russian Prime Minister Viktor S. Chernomyrdin and Ukrainian President Leonid Kravchuk reportedly discussed the incident in a telephone conversation.

Black Sea Fleet commander Eduard Baltin called the attack “the action of uncontrollable gangs.”

The commando raid on the Black Sea base comes at a particularly nervous time in the Crimea, when the growing division between pro-Russians and pro-Ukrainians has some predicting civil war.