ODESSA, August 18. /ITAR-TASS/. Gunmen from the Right Sector group of ultranationalists and Maidan Self-Defense Force units engage in racketeering and banditry in south-east Ukraine’s Odessa under the guise of ‘revolutionary’ activity, an Odessa parliamentarian said in a letter on Monday.

In his official letter to the regional police, Oleg Markov demanded from law enforcement officers to look into this activity in the city, where dozens died in a fire started by Right Sector radicals and supporters from the Maidan Self-Defence Force on May 2. He also demanded setting up a working group involving public figures and media to control them.

This happens “with the connivance of the law enforcement agencies”, he said, also mentioning direct threats to entrepreneurs in social networking systems.

The city council’s deputy also said radicals were setting up training bases in the region, training gunmen to “exert physical coercion on the authorities”.

“Odessa residents live in constant fear, as they don’t know who controls these units and how,” he wrote in the letter.