Standing watch in front of Crimea’s regional parliament in the capital Simferopol, Konstantin Chaika, a pro-Russian civilian in camouflage gear insists he is a “peaceful man.”
But he says he will know “where to look” to find weapons if the situation escalates on the tense Black Sea peninsula, where Russian forces have seized control over the past week and surrounded Ukrainian bases.
Since Ukraine’s pro-Moscow president Viktor Yanukovych was ousted on February 22, this 35-year-old researcher has spent hours standing guard in front of the Stalin-era assembly building, between Cossacks in typical Astrakhan fur hats and angry babushkas — elderly local women — waiting for a hypothetical invasion by “Nazis from Kiev.”
By that, Chaika means the mostly nationalist opposition that toppled Yanukovych from power and led to the instalment of a pro-European Ukrainian government.
“I saw Nazi groups with swastikas on television and on Youtube attacking police and civilians with thousands of Molotov cocktails on Maidan,” Kiev’s Independence Square where violent clashes saw some 100 people killed over three months, says Chaika.
“At the beginning, I didn’t believe it, then I saw that it was real, that we were in danger. So we decided with friends to mobilise,” he says.
“I’m a peaceful man but sometimes you have to know to defend yourself, to fight for your homeland.”
Wearing blue camouflage trousers, a black jacket and wool hat and carrying a small sports bag slung across his back — the contents of which he refuses to disclose — Chaika has just started his shift on the square.
“Sometimes I come here during the day, sometimes at night. I’m lucky to have a flexible job,” he says. “But I have friends who are here all the time.”
– Dreams of a Russian passport –
“A few days ago, there was a rumour that Nazis were coming from the north by train. We rushed to the station but they didn’t come,” he says, reflecting the wild reports that currently circulate in Crimea.
Chaika says he and his comrades were armed with clubs.
“Some of us have guns, legal weapons. If we need more weapons, we will know where to look.”
Although he admits it is unlikely that far-right Ukrainian groups, who were on the forefront of the violence in Kiev, will arrive en masse in Crimea, an autonomous region of Ukraine, he says he fears “acts of provocation.”
His family has lived on the Black Sea peninsula for generations, “some even fought against Russia. (But) we’ve long become Russians,” he says.
“Crimea was actually never really part of Ukraine, it was always a colony.”
Crimea’s authorities have announced a referendum on March 16 on whether to join Russia, a move Kiev has deemed illegal. But Chaika says he will “vote yes, naturally.”
“I’m of Ukrainian nationality, I will never move from here, Crimea is my home. But I dream of a Russian passport,” he says, illustrating the confusion about national identity that is widespread on this rugged peninsula of two million people.
On his bag, he has tied the orange-and-black ribbon representing the order of Saint George, a symbol of Russia’s victory over Nazi Germany during World War Two.
“It’s our tradition,” he says.
On the square, the icy rain that had been falling all day stops as night falls. In a tent in the white-blue-red colours of Russia, white-haired women stir giant pots of borscht soup and hand out salami sandwiches.
As if it were top secret information, Chaika refuses to say how long he will be out here tonight, but admits his wife lives in fear of a violent confrontation ever since he decided to join this “group of friends”.
“(But) she knows that it’s for her and for our son Igor, who is six, that I am here,” he says.