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Derechos | Equipo Nizkor
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| Information | | |
Derechos | Equipo Nizkor
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06Mar14
Obama Says Referendum in Crimea Would Violate Law
As the pro-Russian authorities in Crimea pressed ahead with measures to break away from Ukraine and become part of Russia, President Obama said Thursday that their plans for a referendum would "violate the Ukrainian Constitution and violate international law."
The developments came as the United States and the European Union moved to provide new support for the national government in Kiev and sought ways to press President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia to de-escalate the crisis in Ukraine. The United States announced a framework for imposing new sanctions, while the European Union suspended talks with Russia on a variety of issues including visa liberalization.
Mr. Obama said in Washington: "Any discussion about the future of Ukraine must include the legitimate government of Ukraine. We are well beyond the days when borders can be redrawn over the heads of democratically elected leaders."
The pro-Moscow authorities in Crimea, and the Kremlin itself, seemed to be undeterred by pressure and criticism from abroad. They moved to tighten their grip on the Crimean Peninsula, where Ukrainian military installations were under a blockade by Russian forces.
The regional Parliament in Crimea announced Thursday that a referendum would be held on March 16, two weeks earlier than initially planned, offering citizens of the region a choice of remaining part of Ukraine with greater autonomy from Kiev, or joining the Russian Federation. The referendum, rejected by Ukraine, had originally been scheduled for March 30.
The City Council of Sevastopol, which has a separate legal status from the rest of Crimea, took matching steps on Thursday, voting to hold a similar referendum on March 16. Pro-Russian demonstrators outside government buildings in the city cheered the news and regarded secession from Ukraine as a foregone conclusion.
"We're already Russian," Natasha Malachuk said as she picketed a local security headquarters.
Another protester, Vyacheslav Tokarev, declared, "We're citizens of Russia, we're returning home."
A court in Kiev has already ruled that the Crimean Parliament's actions are broadly illegal. An arrest warrant has been issued for the new prime minister of Crimea, Sergei Aksyonov, who leads a political party called Russian Unity and who was installed a week ago after armed men seized the Parliament building and raised the Russian flag.
Despite such measures, Crimean lawmakers also said on Thursday that they had approved a resolution seeking membership in the Russian Federation.
Officials in Simferopol, the Crimean capital, said that the resolution was a required legal precursor to calling the referendum. The impact of the move and the consequences of its timing, however, appeared unclear. European and Ukrainian authorities rejected the latest moves, saying they violated the Ukrainian Constitution and represented the views only of pro-Russian lawmakers in Crimea.
"My position is that this referendum is unconstitutional," the Ukrainian economy minister, Pavlo Sheremeta, told reporters in Kiev. A senior European official said Ukraine's constitution required any change of territorial sovereignty to be put to a vote of all Ukrainians, not just those in one region.
In Moscow, Dmitri S. Peskov, a spokesman for Mr. Putin, was quoted by Russian news agencies as saying that the Kremlin had been informed of the developments in Crimea but had no further comment. Prime Minister Dmitri A. Medvedev said that Russia would simplify the procedures for people who have lived in Russia or the former Soviet Union to secure Russian citizenship.
Ukraine's interim prime minister, Arseniy P. Yatsenyuk, who was attending the European Union meeting in Brussels, reiterated his call for the Russian government to order their military forces to return to their barracks in Crimea and to withhold support of "the so-called government of Crimea." He told reporters the planned referendum in Crimea was "an illegitimate decision."
[Source: By David M. Herszenhorn and Alan Cowell, The New York Times, 06Mar14]
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