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Russian fleet based in Ukraine condemns activists' "provocation"

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The command of Russia's Black Sea Fleet said Wednesday Ukrainian youth organization activists had tried to illegally enter the fleet's headquarters in the Ukrainian town of Sevastopol.
MOSCOW, June 28 (RIA Novosti) - The command of Russia's Black Sea Fleet said Wednesday Ukrainian youth organization activists had tried to illegally enter the fleet's headquarters in the Ukrainian town of Sevastopol.

Russia's Black Sea Fleet uses a range of naval facilities in Ukraine's largely Russian-speaking Crimea region under a 1997 agreement that allows Russia to stay in the neighboring former Soviet republic for rent of $93 million per year.

"Today at 9.30 a.m. some 10 young people tried to violate the checkpoint border, but were not allowed to enter the Black Sea Fleet's guarded territory," the fleet's press service said. "The fleet command believes that this provocation aims at creating artificial tension around the fleet being based in Ukraine."

The fleet is scheduled to withdraw in 2017, but Ukraine has recently voiced concerns that Russia is not paying enough for the facilities and also demanded that a new agreement be signed on inventorying the base facilities. Russia has said it will make no concessions over rent or withdrawing the fleet, and talks have stalled.

The press service said the move had failed to provoke a response from servicemen. It said that the Black Sea Fleet command would not tolerate any attempts to inflict damage on the fleet's facilities and injure servicemen or civilian personnel, adding that responsibility for the possible consequences would lie on the organizers and perpetrators of any actions.

On June 23, the Black Sea Fleet reported that an attempt was being made to seize a building housing its hydrographic service in Sevastopol, with Ukrainian bailiffs, Interior Ministry and other officials arriving at the building, trying to hand over an order authorizing the seizure of the building and other hydrographic facilities run by the fleet.

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