Forward from: MessageInABottle
I LED TALKS ON DONBAS AND CRIMEA IN THE 90S. HERE’S HOW THE WAR SHOULD END.
After the #USSR’s breakup, the #OSCE knew that the large number of #Russian speakers in #Ukraine would become an issue.
The dilemma, as I shuttled back and forth between #Kiev and #Simferopol, the Crimean capital, was that #Crimea fell under Ukrainian sovereignty, but its population was majority Russian and saw no reason to be part of Ukraine.
From the nineteenth century, Crimea was Russian, until #1954, when Soviet Communist Party Chair Nikita #Khrushchev, for reasons that still have historians scratching their heads, decided to switch Crimea from the #Soviet Russian republic to the Soviet Ukrainian republic.
Even after 1954, Crimea was effectively governed more from #Moscow than from Kyiv.
When the Soviet Union was dissolved, Crimea’s population suddenly found itself a minority in a foreign country.
Ukraine accepted a need for a certain degree of self-rule, but Crimea declared independence as what it called the Crimean Republic.
Over Ukraine’s objection, an election for president was called in the declared Crimean Republic, and a candidate was elected on a platform of merger with Russia.
At the time, however, the Russian government was not prepared to back the Crimeans........ MORE
After the #USSR’s breakup, the #OSCE knew that the large number of #Russian speakers in #Ukraine would become an issue.
The dilemma, as I shuttled back and forth between #Kiev and #Simferopol, the Crimean capital, was that #Crimea fell under Ukrainian sovereignty, but its population was majority Russian and saw no reason to be part of Ukraine.
From the nineteenth century, Crimea was Russian, until #1954, when Soviet Communist Party Chair Nikita #Khrushchev, for reasons that still have historians scratching their heads, decided to switch Crimea from the #Soviet Russian republic to the Soviet Ukrainian republic.
Even after 1954, Crimea was effectively governed more from #Moscow than from Kyiv.
When the Soviet Union was dissolved, Crimea’s population suddenly found itself a minority in a foreign country.
Ukraine accepted a need for a certain degree of self-rule, but Crimea declared independence as what it called the Crimean Republic.
Over Ukraine’s objection, an election for president was called in the declared Crimean Republic, and a candidate was elected on a platform of merger with Russia.
At the time, however, the Russian government was not prepared to back the Crimeans........ MORE