Under the Gun, Crimea Votes Overwhelmingly to Secede From Ukraine

KIEV, Ukraine — Crimean voters gave overwhelming support Sunday to joining Russia and breaking away from Ukraine, the region's top referendum official announced.

With over 50% of the ballots counted shortly after polls closed, Mikhail Malishev, the head of the Crimea referendum committee, reported more than 95% of voters had chosen that the Black Sea peninsula secede from Ukraine and join Russia.

Pro-Kremlin Prime Minister Serhiy Aksyonov, who was voted into power in Crimea's parliament in February as armed men observed and whose authority the new Kiev government does not recognize, moved to push for a speedy entrance into the Russian Federation, announcing that a Crimean delegation would fly to Moscow on Monday morning to ask that lawmakers there bring the peninsula into its fold. Read more...