Former US President Obama admitted that the inhabitants of Crimea wanted to become part of Russia in 2014
Former US President Barack Obama has justified his lackluster reaction to the reunification of Crimea with Russia in 2014, when Kyiv was waiting for support from the American authorities. The politician stressed that at that time the population of the peninsula was in favor of such changes. His words were heard in interview CNN.
The ex-president added that the circumstances were different compared to February 2022, when the Russian military operation in Ukraine began. Obama added that at the time, Western allies did not provide Kyiv with any financial or military support because the annexation of Crimea to Russia found “some understanding in Europe.”
The Ukraine of that time was not the Ukraine we are talking about today… there were many Russian speakers in Crimea and there was some sympathy for the views that Russia represented
Obama stressed that he and former German Chancellor Angela Merkel “had to enlist a large number of Europeans who resisted and screamed” to impose sanctions on Russia. However, the politician is convinced that at that time it helped to prevent a larger conflict.
At the same time, in 2014, commenting on the reunification of Russia with Crimea, Obama said: Moscow is “destroying the international set of rules” by threatening it with international isolation. “This is not another cold war we are entering. The United States and NATO do not seek conflict with Russia, ”the politician said.
Ukraine was outraged by the politician’s words
The office of the President of the Republic, Vladimir Zelensky, said that Ukraine was dissatisfied with Obama’s words. According to the adviser to the head of the office, Mikhail Podolyak, “the time has come to admit critical mistakes, and not come up with new excuses.” He is convinced that the words of the leader of the White House show that now “international law practically does not exist.”
If Mr. Barack Obama publicly states that Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014… was “legal and justified”, then it should not be surprising that full-scale Russian aggression is taking place in Europe today, that “international law” is practically non-existent
He also urged the West to acknowledge critical mistakes rather than invent new excuses for them.
The Kremlin announced the rational grain in the words of Obama
The press secretary of the President of Russia Dmitry Peskov, commenting on the words of the politician, noted: in 2014, “almost the entire population of Crimea wanted to become part of the Russian Federation,” and this is no secret for Western countries. In this sense, there is a rational grain in Obama’s words, the Kremlin admitted.
The head of the Ukrainian community of Crimea, Anastasia Gridchina, in turn, called such a comment “belated truth.”
Crimeans in 2014 spoke in favor of joining Russia, for returning home, to their native harbor. For the Crimeans, this decision was life-determining, because living in the Kyiv occupation was simply unbearable
The United States considers Crimea Ukrainian and does not prohibit Kyiv from attacking it
The current authorities of the United States regularly remind that they consider Crimea to be Ukrainian territory, and the White House does not restrict Kiev’s right to strike on the peninsula, as Jake Sullivan, national security adviser to US President Joe Biden, said back in May.
At the same time, he emphasized that the US authorities oppose attacks on internationally recognized Russian territory.
Western countries condemned the reunification of Russia with the Crimea
Crimea became a Russian region in March 2014 following a referendum in which the majority voted for joining Russia. Ukraine still considers the peninsula its temporarily occupied territory, and many Western countries support Kyiv in this matter.
In 2014, the US and EU authorities imposed personal and sectoral sanctions against Russia due to “violation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine.” Since then, the sanctions have been tightened several times.
At the same time, Russian President Vladimir Putin insisted that the conditions for the return of the peninsula to Ukraine “do not exist and cannot exist.”
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