Crimea is next concern over Russia's plans | Philadelphia Inquirer | 10/12/2008

SEVASTOPOL, Ukraine - Russian tricolors flutter in the wind from Soviet-era buildings in this Black Sea port city, Russian-language billboards dot the sunlit streets, and proud gray warships ride at anchor in a Russian naval base.

Only a few yellow-and-blue flags remind visitors that this is Ukraine, not Russia.

After Moscow's swift triumph over Georgia's armed forces in August, there are fears that the Kremlin may turn its attention to another neighbor, Ukraine, that has sought to break out of Russia's orbit. And nowhere in Ukraine does the Kremlin have more influence than here on the sunny Crimean peninsula, where ethnic Russians are 60 percent of the two million population, many of them yearning for unification with Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin's Russia.