Ukraine sends elite unit to Odessa due to unrest

ODESSA, Ukraine – Ukraine sent an elite national guard unit to re-establish control Monday over the southern port of Odessa, and government troops fought pitched gunbattles with a pro-Russia militia around an eastern city.

The government in Kiev intensified its attempts to bring both regions back under its control but seemed particularly alarmed by the bloodshed in Odessa. It had been largely peaceful until Friday, when clashes killed 46 people, many of them in a government building that was set on fire.

The tensions in Ukraine also raised concerns in neighboring Moldova, another former Soviet republic, where the government said late Monday it had put its borders on alert. Moldova’s breakaway Trans-Dniester region, located just northwest of Odessa and home to 1,500 Russian troops, is supported by Moscow, and many of its residents sympathize with the pro-Russia insurgency.

The loss of Odessa – in addition to a swath of industrial eastern Ukraine – would be catastrophic for the interim government in Kiev, leaving the country cut off from the Black Sea. Ukraine already lost a significant part of its coastline in March, when its Crimean Peninsula was annexed by Russia.

Compared with eastern Ukraine, Odessa is a wealthy city with an educated and ethnically diverse population of more than 1 million. Jews still make up 12 percent of the population of the city, which once had a large Jewish community.

The White House said it was “extremely concerned” by the violence in southern Ukraine.

“The events in Odessa dramatically underscore the need for an immediate de-escalation of tensions in Ukraine,” spokesman Jay Carney said. He suggested Russia still must follow through with its part of a diplomatic deal aimed at defusing the tensions.

In eastern Ukraine, gunfire and multiple explosions rang out in and around Slovyansk, a city of 125,000 in the Russian-speaking heartland that has become the focus of the armed insurgency against the government in Kiev.

Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov said in a statement that government troops were battling about 800 pro-Russia forces, which were deploying large-caliber weapons and mortars. His ministry reported four officers killed and 30 wounded in the fighting.

The pro-Russia militia said at least eight people, both militiamen and local residents, were killed.