KIEV, Feb. 24 - Ukraine's fugitive president was indicted for "mass murder" on Monday over the shooting of demonstrators as new leaders in Kiev sought urgent Western aid to make up for a loss of funding from Russia, which is angry at the overthrow of its ally.

Moscow said it would not deal with those who led an "armed mutiny" against Viktor Yanukovych, who was elected in 2010, and said it now feared for the lives of its citizens, notably in the Russian-speaking east and Crimea on the Black Sea.

Russia's top general agreed with NATO to maintain contact on a crisis that has raised fears of civil war and which U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon said called for an "inclusive political process" that "preserves Ukraine's ... territorial integrity,” Reuters reported.

While Russia, its strategy for maintaining influence in its former Soviet neighbor in shreds, made clear its $15 billion package of loans and cheap gas deals was in jeopardy, the European Union and United States offered urgent financial assistance for a new government that may be formed on Tuesday.

They were responding to warnings from Ukraine's acting head of state that the country was heading for bankruptcy.

The acting interior minister - appointed by parliament when Yanukovych fled at the weekend after mass protests sparked by his rejection of closer ties with the European Union - said the 63-year-old was now on the wanted list and had last been seen at Balaclava in Crimea, near Russia's Sevastopol naval base.

"An official case for the mass murder of peaceful citizens has been opened," Arsen Avakov wrote on Facebook, referring to the shooting by police marksmen of many of the 82 people killed in two days of bloodshed in Kiev last week.

"Yanukovych and other people responsible for this have been declared wanted," he added.

The ousted president was still at large, Avakov said. He had left by helicopter on Friday from Kiev, where his lavish residence was quickly overwhelmed by curious compatriots who took its lavish fittings as proof of grandiose corruption.

Having arrived in his power base in the industrial east, Yanukovych was prevented from flying out of the country and then diverted south to Crimea. He had later left a private residence at Balaclava for an unknown destination, by car with one of his aides and a handful of guards.

Pursuing a political opponent who had already appeared last week to have lost the confidence of Moscow and of Ukraine's wealthy business "oligarchs" is popular with protesters still occupying Kiev's Independence Square, close to parliament.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said Moscow had grave doubts about the legitimacy of those now in power in Ukraine and their recognition by some states was an "aberration".

"We do not understand what is going on there. There is a real threat to our interests and to the lives of our citizens," Medvedev was quoted as saying by Russian news agencies.

Russia cited a duty to protect the lives of its citizens in 2008 as one justification for military intervention in Georgia, another former Soviet republic, in support of Kremlin-backed separatists in South Ossetia. (rt/ez)