Jittery customers run on banks in Crimea

Citizens concerned regarding uncertainty of peninsula's future

3/13/2014
ASSOCIATED PRESS
  • Biden-US-Ukraine

    Ukraine Prime Minister Arseniy, right, waves as he is greeted by US acting Chief of Protocol Natalie Jones, left, during his arrival at the White House in Washington, Thursday, March 13, 2014. Arseniy is meeting with Vice President Joe Biden before traveling to New York to visit the United Nations. (AP Photo/Manuel Balce Ceneta)

    ASSOCIATED PRESS

    • SIMFEROPOL, Ukraine — Ukraine’s largest bank says customers in the nation’s Crimean Peninsula are lining up to withdraw cash from their accounts as the region occupied by Russian troops prepares for Sunday’s referendum on joining Russia.

    Lines of customers could be seen forming today outside Privat and other banks amid uncertainty over the peninsula’s future.

    Oleh Serha, a spokesman for Privat bank, said all banks in Crimea are struggling to deliver more cash to the region, where tensions are high between ethnic Russians and minority ethnic Ukrainians and Tartars.

    Serha said the bank has imposed a limit of 1,500 hryvna ($150) on daily withdrawals across all of Ukraine.

    Its government and Western nations have denounced the referendum as illegitimate and warned Russia against trying to annex Crimea.