Press-Conference by First Deputy Permanent Representative Dmitry Polyanskiy on the 5th anniversary of Crimea’s Reunification with Russia
I welcome everybody here and I am very glad to organize this press-conference devoted to the 5th anniversary of the reunification of the Crimean Peninsula with Russia. I understand, that there can be different interpretations of this event – it depends on the optics that you choose for this. We choose a very optimistic optics.
We say that five years ago we managed to save more than two million people from the fate, that now you see on the example of people of Donbass. There is a lot of information that allegedly this whole situation had been calculated in advance, that Russia had had certain plans to annex (as they put it) Crimea, that this all had been premeditated.
But I was the witness of these events five years ago. I was working for the Foreign Ministry and I remember how confused we all were about the information that was coming about the consequences of the Maidan coup in Kiev, about the threats that the people of Crimea received. I mean threats to their lives, not only to their existence as a peninsula – and the Russian leadership had to react quickly. Looking back for five years, we can say that we do not regret the way it was done and the outcome of what happened.
I have a lot of information and figures here in this green file, I will open it if you need it. However, I do not know what kind of information is more interesting to you. As you might know, on Friday there was an Arria Formula Security Council meeting devoted to the Crimea. Again, you can raise questions about the name of this Arria meeting. It was not the optics that we choose, but the outcome was quite okay for us, because we managed again to present our position to the whole world. We have nothing to be ashamed of – we have a lot of things to be proud of.
During last three days, there are festivities in the Crimea and in the rest of Russia. Today my President visited the Crimea. If I am not mistaken, it happened for 20th time during these five years. It means there is great attention attached to this region of the Russian Federation. The reason for his coming there is not only participation in the festivities, but also the formal opening of two power stations which make Crimea absolutely independent from Ukraine in terms of energy. We had big problems with this in 2014, when in the fall there was an attempt of Ukraine to disrupt the flow of energy to the peninsula. There was a total blackout and we had to think of emergency measures to provide basic supplies to the people of Crimea. They managed to survive this difficult period and now they are not only energy independent, but they are capable of exporting energy to some Southern regions of Russia.
The same about water. It is a more difficult problem, because geologically the Crimean Peninsula is a very difficult one for the exploration of water resources, but we also are solving this issue quite quickly.
The same about transport blockade. You know that since the end of 2014 Ukraine has been limiting the crossing of the de facto border with the Russian Federation in the Crimea, in the Northern part of Crimea. If you are a foreigner and even if you hold a Russian visa, you will not be allowed to enter the Crimean Peninsula from the North. The only way you can do it is from Russia. For Ukrainians there are no limitations. Last year there was a record flow of Ukrainians – according to our statistics about one million people came to the Crimea of total of 6.5 million tourists, which is a record for this peninsula. It is compatible with the Soviet times of tourist industry in this region.
Crimea is an absolutely open region. We have nothing to conceal or to hide. Everybody is welcomed there – there are a lot of journalists, foreign delegations, and those, who are not afraid to come there. I mean afraid not of being harassed, or arrested in the Crimea, but of being pointed finger at in the Western media, who would say that they bowed to pressure from Russia or from Russian agents.
However, people are coming and there are absolutely no restriction on visiting the Crimea, no matter who you are: a journalist, a politician, a businessman. There are a lot of expats living there.
All the people of the Crimean Peninsula de facto face a kind of visa isolation, because a lot of Western countries, including this host country, simply try to claim that this people do not exist. They do not want to issue visas for them. They tell us scary fairytales about what is happening there. I devoted the last part of my intervention on Friday to these fairytales.
Again, I am here, I am open to your questions. I am not sure, what would be most interesting to you. That is why I will stop at this point and with pleasure take your questions about concrete issues.
Q.: Thank you, Ambassador. The General Assembly passed a resolution on this, and a hundred countries voted in favor of it. A lot of those countries are under resolution, I guess, they accuse Russia of basically violating Ukraine’s sovereignty. How do you think, does this affect Russia’s defensive sovereignty here at the UN, when you are talking about other situations, such as Venezuela?
A.: I do not think that it is in any way linked to the Venezuela issue. At least I myself do not see such a link. It is a very tricky issue, because what happened there, it is and it will be a topic of study for different scholars. In order to understand this, you need to follow this situation in a retrospective, so you need to see what happened at the begging of the 90-s, when Khrushchev gave the Crimea to Ukraine for certain reasons, that I do not want to cite now. It was not a popular decision at that time.
For people, it was not a very big difference, when you lived in the USSR, whether it was the Crimea, Russia or Ukraine. Same was applicable to Abkhazia and Georgia for example. It was really very formal, and people did not very much feel attached to Ukraine, when they lived in the Crimea. It was rather an administrative arrangement, but when the Soviet Union was breaking out, it was a painful issue and there were a couple of referendums in the Crimea, which the Ukrainian authorities consequently ignored. I touched upon this issue during my intervention at the Arria formula meeting.
In March 1991 there was a referendum where all the citizens of the Soviet Union, all the Republics were asked a question: “Do you want the dissolution of Soviet Union or do you want continue within the Soviet Union?” The overwhelming results with the exception of, I think, Baltic states, Georgia, which did not participate if I am not mistaken, was in favor of the preservation of the Soviet Union – this is one thing. The other thing is that the Crimea also held a referendum approximately at this time, where they voted in favor of the restoration of the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Republic. The status of that Republic would put it directly under Moscow, not under Ukraine. So the voters clearly show that in this turbulent times they wanted to secure themselves within a certain entity, which was allowed by the Soviet constitution at that time.
When the independent Ukraine was created, there was another referendum in the Crimea and the majority of participants voted in favor of an autonomous status of this peninsula, which they had during the Soviet times. However, the Ukrainian leadership ignored this since the very begging and made absolutely no reference to the desire of the people of Crimea to have a kind of autonomy. They also canceled the office of president of the Crimea, which was agreed at the referendum. If you come back to that time, you will see there were a lot of irregularities at the moment when the Crimea became part of Ukraine. We did not object to this, because we wanted to have good neighborly relations with Ukraine. I am saying this now only to show that the people of this peninsula always were trying to retain a kind of autonomy, a kind of independence, and they were very much inclined towards Russia. This fact was ignored in Ukraine for many years.
So, what happened in 2014? The right of nations to self-determination prevailed. You cannot analyze such situations in general terms. I mean all these situations, because they are all different. You can cite the situation in Kosovo, which is to a certain degree comparable. In Kosovo, there was no consent of Belgrade to the situation that happened afterwards. The Western powers used to defend, and they still do, the right of Kosovo-Albanian people to self-determination. However, they do not apply this to the Crimea, whereas in the Crimea there was a referendum.
Some people and a lot of those present in this hall might say: “Well, this is a questionable result”. But look at the comments of people who visited the Crimea, look at the results of opinion polls, and you will see that the level of support for the idea of entering the Russian Federation remains more or less the same. It is much above 70%. According to some polls, it stands close to 90%. The Region became part of Russia and had to endure a lot of painful but necessary economic reforms, but even now the people of the Crimea say that they do not regret that desire. We are not afraid to show Crimea to the world and let the Crimeans speak to correspondents, to Westerners, to whoever they like, and to present their real position.
We think that you cannot ignore the right of the Crimean population to this. We also think that what happened there was kind of a practical implementation of the preventive policy, if you want me to put it like this. These people were threatened, they were threatened directly. Of course now Ukrainian politicians try to forget about this, but we all remember what happened.
There were direct threats. There were lots of nationalists, who were trying to penetrate the borders of the peninsula. It was absolutely clear that the authorities, the junta that came to power in Kiev aimed at cleansing this Russian element out of the Crimea. They were not ready to accept the fact that the inhabitants of peninsula wanted to retain their cultural face. All they wanted was to continue speaking Russian, to teach Russian to their children, to worship the heroes that had liberated Ukraine from Nazis, not those who collaborated with them. The requirements were very simple, but it was a matter of principle.
If you look at the rest of Ukraine now, you will see that the principles of Maidan prevail. They are being imposed on the population. This is the problem of ethnic tension within Ukraine. Looking back, the people of the Crimea and all of us think that we did the absolutely right thing to save the lives of these people and to ensure their right to be who they are – the Russian speaking population. They were loyal citizens of Ukraine, but they were threatened by the Maidan coup. What was done was a necessary step, and we do not regret it.
Q.: I just want to clarify: it does not undermine Russia’s defensive sovereignty, does it?
A.: It does not undermine our position on any other issue. All the issues are unique. You cannot speak of a general rule. You need to examine all the details and the concrete circumstances in which they occur.
Q.: Ambassador, you mentioned that this situation with the Crimea is somehow similar to the situation with Kosovo. On the other hand, your position is well-known in the Security Council and beyond. You do not support Kosovo’s independence. Do you recognize some other similarity? Or if the US, the EU and the world somehow silently allowed you to go ahead with this annexation of the Crimea or whatever you call it, would you then accept the independence of Kosovo? Thank you.
A.: I am afraid I was misunderstood, but I really did not say that these cases were similar. I believe that they can be compared though. I wanted to analyze them from the point of view of different reaction of our Western colleagues. They were supportive of such move in terms of Kosovo, but were not supportive of what happened in the Crimea. There are a lot of different things about Crimea and Kosovo. I do not remember that there was a referendum in Kosovo. A referendum in Kosovo about this? About independence? I do not remember such thing. Of course I might be mistaken, but still. Maybe we are both mistaken. Sometimes it happens.
Again, the situation was totally different in the Crimea. You take different situations, when there is the right of peoples to self-determination in question, and you will see that the recipe for tackling this issue can be different in each case. There is no general rule about this. That is why I would not speculate on the theoretical opportunity of how we would react to a change of position of our Western partners. Things already happened. For us the status of Crimea within Russia is absolutely clear. It is irreversible. At the same time, we absolutely respect the position of our Serbian colleagues. We think what happened in Kosovo was a total breach of sovereignty of Serbia, with force as well. Our position is absolutely different there.
Q.: You mentioned that you were taken by surprise by the events in Ukraine. But in 1997 in his book ‘The Grand Chessboard’ Zbigniew Brzezinski stated that it is absolutely imperative for the West to separate Ukraine from Russia and to isolate Russia. Can you comment upon the authorities of the West deciding the future of Russia’s relations with Ukraine? And secondly, there was an organization called ‘World Without Nazism’ which was not permitted into Ukraine when Mr. Yushchenko was president. When Mr. Yanukovych was, they were permitted into Ukraine. It is my understanding that Victoria Nooland and her colleagues very aggressively put into office a government that was sympathetic to the Nazis. To what extent did Ukrainians resent this? And just as follow-up. You mentioned that there was a power cut by the Ukrainians to the people in Crimea. And since the comparison was made to Venezuela. Could you comment on possible power cut for Venezuela by another country?
A.: Today the audience is much inclined to see similarities between different cases. I would not speculate about the situation with power cuts in Venezuela. Of course there should be an investigation and we should determine the origins and the reasons for what gas happened. But I would comment on other idea that you spoke about. About the role of the West in the events in Ukraine. We always say that the so called Maidan events, the revolution of dignity as the Ukrainians put it was very much influenced – to put it mildly – by the West. There are many proofs of this. There are many circumstances that are very vague and poorly investigated. What happened at Maidan? What was the role of Viktor Yanukovich? How did this coup take place? All of it is kind of out of interest for the West. They claim that there was an uprising against Yanukovich and that everything is absolutely clear for them. However, nothing is absolutely clear for us.
What we see now to a larger extent are reprecussions of what happened during this terrible time. You were absolutely right when you pointed out that there was huge growth of extremism and Nazism in Ukraine, which is very worrying for us. It was the starting point of the entire situation with the Crimea and with Donbass. There were nationalists who were coming to power in Ukraine, and who still are in power. There are many neo-Nazi elements that the West prefer not to see and these people started to threaten their former compatriots. They wanted to create some kind of a ‘Ukraine über Alles’ situation. Some regions, especially with Russia-speaking population tried to resist. That is why the existence and the support that the extremists and right elements were gaining in Ukraine is still a very important factor in the relations of Russia and Ukraine. There are people in Ukraine who really understand that Russia and Ukraine should be good neighbors, however there is a big stumbling block that they cannot step over, and they have to act in the same way they have been acting up to now.
We are much worried to see that our Western colleagues are supportive of these elements. They try to ignore the extremist nature of these elements in Ukraine. It is strange for us, because this is a kind of a time bomb in the center of Europe. I always ask my Polish colleagues, how they tolerate the existence of a State that worships Bandera and other nationalists who killed many thousand Ukrainian and Russian Jews during World War 2. I asked who they tolerated those people being in power. I used to work in Poland for three years. I know how resentful the Polish population is of those ‘fighters’ if I can put it this way.
There is still no reaction of the West. During the electoral campaign that runs now there are situations when the incumbent President, Mr. Poroshenko is faced be nationalists and even chased by them from meetings.
For us it is a very worrying phenomenon. Russia and Ukraine are neighbors. We have to bear in mind all the possible developments in this country. The West seems to be absolutely indifferent about this. They say that those are only Russian ‘fairytales’ and that the situation if fine. Well, it is not. This is another element that supports the belief of the people of Crimea and of Russia that we did the right thing five years ago.
Q.: Thank you, Ambassador. I have a question about the upcoming elections in Ukraine. In January, Facebook detected about 150 accounts that appeared to be involved in the spread of some information. Similar activities were seen ahead of the presidential elections in the US. They linked these accounts to Russia. Ukrainian officials have also accused Russia of seeking to interfere in some way in the upcoming elections. Could you please comment on those accusations? Russia has often accused the West of interfering in the situation in Ukraine as well. I wonder if you have seen similar objectionable activities from the side of the West ahead of these elections.
A.: It is a good question, a kind of a philosophical one. It is about the role of social media and Internet as a whole. Internet is an open platform. We are not afraid of that, or of the Facebook. Please correct me if I am wrong, but I have not seen any concrete proofs or opinions that some accounts on Facebook, Twitter or, say Instagram, influenced to a decisive extent the situation in the US, Europe or elsewhere. We also have problems with various accounts on Facebook that are full of hatred, that incite violence. We combat these things, but these are the rules of the game. Since it is an open platform, there certainly are people who try to use it for their purposes. However, we are not looking for an arm of some State that we believe would guide all these accounts. We are not in favor of conspiracy theories. All of this is very fictional, I would say.
If we speak about the influence of the West in Ukraine, I can remember the words of Victoria Nuland, if I am not mistaken. She acknowledged by chance that she had in her possession five billion USD to influence the situation in Ukraine.
We see a lot of interference in the internal affairs of sovereign States. Direct interference, I dare say. It is not about Venezuela and it is not about Facebook. It is about concrete people doing concrete things. I guess it is trendy now to blame Russia for everything. Russia is a nice scapegoat for the West. If nothing comes out of what you are doing, just blame it on Russia, and everyone will say: “Yeah, of course those are the bad Russians who stand behind this.” There is such a trend in many countries, e.g in this host country, and this is very much worrying.
I do not think these publications in social media can be considered of such paramount importance for influencing the situation in this or that country. If it is free media and free press, you should be accepting the opinions of others. Otherwise, it would resemble the Communist times, when no free media or free press was available and everybody advocated one and the same opinion. Now in the West if you do not share the opinion of mainstream media or of the leaders of some countries – it is considered Russian propaganda.
Q.: I was not talking about differences in opinion; I was talking about the false information.
A.: You mean fake news then, do you not? If it is about fake news, our Foreign Ministry launched a web page devoted to fake news against Russia. There are dozens of recent publications, which can absolutely be classified as fake news. Still we do not over-exaggerate it. We do not believe it is a State campaign of one or several countries against Russia. This is the Internet and this is free media. Just be prepared for diverging opinions. If it is fake, you need to refute this, which we do. We cannot be responsible for any publication on Facebook or on Twitter. We do not believe in conspiracies of people who are sitting somewhere, clicking on icons and posting those publications. This is worth a nice Hollywood movie, or a couple of movies, but not the real life. It would be nice if we all left those illusions and started dealing with things that matter, of which there are a lot. Have I answered your question? Thank you.
Q.: I have actually two questions. First, how many Member States recognize Crimea as a part of Russia? The second question is - why during the last five years none of the Russian major businesses, both state and private, expended to the Crimea? Does this indicate that there is an understanding even within the Russian government that the annexation of Crimea is illegal and that the Russian companies do not want to be held accountable for unlawful political decisions?
A.: Thank you for these questions. I am not sure how many member states recognized Crimea but frankly speaking it does not matter. We did things that we did not in order to be recognized by the rest of the world, I mean that these steps would be recognized. At the moment when this measure was taken, I think everybody had absolutely no illusions of how it would be put in the world. We understood that there would be a furious reaction to this in the West, that few countries would recognize this move but this was about saving people’s life, first of all. I think that this thing matters much more than a kind of recognition. Recognition will come and it is a matter of time, maybe years, I do not know, but it does not matter very much, because people live there, and if you come there (and you are most welcome to come), you will see it with your own eyes. As for the companies that are represented there, I think there is such a fear. Western companies, for example, do not want to be represented there. It is the same as collateral sanctions, that the United States imposes on those who cooperate with Iran, or in other situations like this. Of course, big businesses do not want to be associated with this move, which for them is a bit problematic.
Russian, European or American… I do not know, but, again, even without such a big participation of foreign business, the peninsula thrives already. Could you imagine what would become of it if and when the situation changes? So this fact does not affect the life of the peninsula very much. It does not affect the life of the Crimeans. They understand that the international community tries to ignore the fact that they are alive, they leave in Russia and that this was their free choice, but they have already got accustomed to this situation. It does not very much influence their life, so at some point this will change – we are patient. We know that we are doing the right thing and we are very much keen to continue like this. It is up to the international community to make conclusions, not to us.
Q.: Let me clarify one thing if I understand it correctly. Being a member of the United Nations, you say that the point of view of the majority of the UN Member States does not matter, do you not?
A.: It does matter of course. I said it in the context when people’s life are threatened. For example, whether a person stays alive or gets burnt alive as was the case in Odessa. We chose life, we chose prosperity.
Again, we understood what the reaction of international community would be. We have absolutely no illusions but these are incompatible things.
Life of people, their right to speak the language they want and worship the heroes they want on the one hand; and position of international community on the other. It is not the only situation when the international community is not united on what is happening in this or that region.
I quoted during the Arria Formula meeting that since 2014 the level of international support or I would say the level of interest towards the position of Ukrainian authorities has diminished drastically. The first Crimean resolution was supported by, if I am not mistaken, about a hundred countries. The last resolution introduced by Ukraine in autumn this year was a combined provocative resolution against Russia, there was Crimea, Donbass, Azov and everything else in it, like in a mixed salad. This “salad” also received some support. However, about 127 countries, if I am not mistaken, in one form or another did not support this idea and this initiative of the Ukrainian side. I think it is a clear indication that the support and the interest for the Ukrainian position on the Crimea is vanishing. For us it is a clear sign. Thank you for the question.
Q.: I want you to follow up with something you just said which is “recognition will come”. Clearly now the position of the United Nations and its agencies is that Crimea is not part of Russia, it is part of Ukraine. Explain to us what difficulties that gives in the governance of Crimea in terms of relations with the United Nations and UN bodies. What is the strategy of your mission here at the United Nations in order to get that recognition? What do you be going back to the General Assembly anytime soon now that 5 years have passed?
A.: May I start from the second question. Actually we do not have any strategy for this. We do not have any instructions go to the General Assembly and fight for the recognition of Crimea. Again, people live there. We understand the position of the international community. We understand that international community is not ready at this point to change its position, but people live there. Our priority is to give them normal conditions for life, to create a favorable economic environment, to give them the necessary impetus for development.
What are the shortcomings for this? Well, there are bilateral sanctions as you know, but they are so numerous and some of them are being introduced in advance that we already do not count them. We have got used to this situation. It is very favorable for our industry and agriculture. This issue happens somewhere in another reality I would say.
You see that we interact with all our partners in the United Nations. It creates absolutely no problems for this interaction. Of course, it creates a lot of awkward situations for people who live in Crimea. For example, the only possibility for them to get a Schengen visa would be to go to Kiev, which is not the way they can do it. That is why they do not get Schengen visa or they find some other possibilities how to do it. Of course this is not the best situation.
There are some other things that are not possible to implement in the Crimea so far regarding cooperation within the international community. Crimean clubs are not playing in our soccer league which is of course deplorable. They want to do, and at some point they will be playing there. They train, they get necessary funding, so this is not the most difficult situation in the world.
I want to reiterate that these are two different issues. One is the life of Crimean population, their right to diversity if I can put it this way. Another – some awkward economic, political and other situations which can be really awkward, which can be really annoying but there is absolutely no choice between the life of a person and some awkward economic or political situation. That is why I do not think we can put it at the same level of urgency.
Q.: Thank you very much, Mr. Ambassador. You are very welcome on behalf of the UN Correspondents Association. Two questions. First, the negotiations in various groups on trying to resolve the situation between Ukraine and Russia, Eastern Ukraine, Donbass appeared to be in a stalemate, particularly at this point. Is there any hope in Moscow that the results of the upcoming Ukrainian elections could make a difference in trying to resolve the dispute between the two countries? And secondly, could you give us an update on what happened with the Ukrainian sailors on three ships that were seized?
A.: Two good questions. As for the elections, I am not entitled, of course, and I am not willing to comment on the electoral situation in Ukraine. This is another country and it is up to Ukraine to hold elections and to elect whomever they want. Of course, we do have hopes to get at the end of these elections some authorities, some personalities who are, first of all, trustworthy, and, secondly, with whom we can really discuss our relations.
If I am not mistaken, on April 1st the Treaty of Friendship between Russia and Ukraine loses its legal value following the initiative of the Ukrainian side. It effects in fact a lot of people. There are 3.5 million Ukrainian workers in Russia and their rights are guaranteed by this treaty. So some people in Ukraine right now promote such moves which are very detrimental to the well-being of Ukrainians themselves. That is why it is worrying for us.
Is is very difficult to say whether it could help. For example, the issue of Donbass: basic approach of all the candidates seems to be more or less the same. They say that there is allegedly Russian aggression in the East of Ukraine, this is not a domestic problem of Ukrainians, but this is a problem of Ukraine and Russia. We absolutely deny such an approach. There are the Minsk Agreements. The Republics of Donetsk and Lugansk are parties to that agreement. We see that the only way to solve these issues would be to have a dialogue with them.
Ambassador Nebenzia during a couple of meetings in the Security Council asked why the SC is so insistent to see the dialogue between the governments of Syria or Yemen with rebels, but when it comes to Ukraine there is absolutely no understanding of the real situation, of what is happening there. I can also draw your attention to the fact that at a recent meeting on Ukraine in the SC, maybe two months ago, we had the head of OSCE Special Monitoring Mission Mr. Apakan. We asked him very awkward questions for him, after the Ukrainian representatives had cited again: «Hundreds of Russian tanks, thousands of Russian troops are coming there». We asked the person who is entitled to supervise all this – do you see any proof, any reason to believe it? He was in a very awkward situation, it took him some time, but then he gave a very brave answer, that he did not seem to see all these proofs. It is very difficult to chase a black cat in a dark room, especially if there is no black cat.
It is stipulated in the Minsk Agreements – the two republics will eventually become part of Ukraine, but it is more comfortable for them to say that this is a problem between Russia and Ukraine. It is very easy to explain all the problems of Ukraine by the Russian aggression. It is a very easy position, same as «Russia did it». In Ukraine it is implemented 100%.
As for the sailors, you know our position about this. First of all, the events that happened in the end of November were meant to be a provocation, because they violated the border of the Russian Federation in the zone that was Russian even before the events of 2014. They absolutely knew how such sailings to the ports in Azov Sea need to be conducted, because in September there was a convoy of military ships that passed to Mariupol. There were absolutely no problems. So they knew the procedure, but they deliberately wanted to provoke Russian borderguards. It happened in the Black Sea, it happened in the Azov sea, they wanted to enter the Kerch strait. We have to be vigilant about this, because we receive a lot of threats from Ukrainian nationalists about the Crimean Bridge. So there was no surprise for them, when they wanted to enter the region of Azov Sea.
Last Friday there was a daughter of one of the sailors present at the meeting, she asked me a question about her father. As far as I know, there were several medical visits in January. It was stated that these sailors are absolutely out of any danger. But they violated the State border of the Russian Federation. That is why we need two complete some necessary procedures. We need to find out during an investigation what is the level of their guilt. I assume that it is not the highest guilt, because someone in Kiev or elsewhere gave them this criminal order to enter our territorial waters, to provoke our border guards. There are a lot of indications that they were meant to be a kind of sacrifice, but common sense prevailed and they surrendered. They did a very right thing. Nevertheless, we need to tackle this situation according to the laws of the Russian Federation. They are treated normally, they are in good health, they do not lack medical attention or medical service. As soon as we complete our internal procedures, their fate will be decided. I hope that they will have an opportunity to return to their home country.
Q.: Last week the UN published a report about the human rights in Ukraine and, as I understand, there are some parts about human rights violations in the Crimea. I wonder whether you saw this report. How did the experts come to these conclusions? Did they visit the Crimea? Did you talk to these experts? How Russia is going to meet these concerns?
A.: Thank you very much for this question. We paid attention to this report. The problem is that people who would like to make conclusions about what is happening in the Crimea, they actually do not go there. They have information from third biased sources. They are biased, because of some political or personal reasoning behind them.
Last Friday during the Arria Formula meeting I asked everybody, who had the chance to visit the Crimea during last 5 years, to raise their hands. There was no one, except myself. It is very difficult to judge about what is happening, if you do not go to this territory. We invited everybody to go there. The problem is, of course, that as a part of the Russian Federation, you need to receive Russian visa. Here the problem starts. People say that they do not want to receive Russian visas because for them it is a part of Ukraine and this would be a violation and so on. Again – you want to do business or what? If you want to speak to the Crimeans, then go to the Crimea. This is the only way to do it. Otherwise, all these reports that we see in different sources, they are very questionable. We cannot trust them.
That is why we encourage everybody to go and see what is happening with their own eyes. There might be some problems. Every region and every country have a lot of problems and we do not conceal it, but the general situation is very positive. You would see it if you went to the Crimea.
There are many issues about the situation with human rights at the territory of Ukrainian, but I will not comment on them because it is not part of our press-conference. There are more and more indications that the situation is deteriorating. Even through these reports, that are very much filtered, you can see that the situation is really very bad. However, we get information through other sources, through our relatives, friends who still remain in Ukraine. The situation there is not very much encouraging.
Q.: Since you say Russia is not involved in the conflict in Donbass and you consistently reject the idea or the possibility of the UN peacekeeping force there – as “The USA today” said you were still rejecting that. So what would you say?
A.: That is a prove that we and the US may be living in different realities. We do not only reject the idea of peacekeeping force. The only proposal of the Draft Resolution in the UN is Russian Draft. The thing is that there is a Minsk Package of Measures, which was endorsed by UNSC resolution.
There is a number of steps which should be consequent. You cannot implement step #13 after step #8 and so on. They should be implemented from 1 to 13. We say that any UNSC resolution for peacekeeping force or whatever should support the Minsk Package of Measures and should not contradict it. It is our basic position. As soon as there is a solution that would respect the Minsk Package we will support it and support this kind of peacekeeping force. This is our proposal which was made in 2017. It is weird to hear that Russia is not supporting it. We do support, but the Minsk Agreements is the only framework for the resolution of the conflict in Donbass. It has very concrete strict provisions that should be implemented. The other issue – they are more and more questioned in Ukraine because it is an awkward topic for some politicians. When Mr. Medvedchuk (who was and I think is the representative of Ukraine at Minsk negotiation process) said that this would be problematic for the Ukrainian authorities to implement the Minsk Agreements and to seek direct dialogue, which is really the only way to solve this issue, he was threatened by a criminal case.
This is very worrying, there is a clear trend to revise Minsk Agreements, to question them in Ukraine, whereas the West remains either silent or supportive of such moves. We think there is no other alternative even from the point of view that it is endorsed by the UN Security Council, and not only by the resolution but by the Press Statement that was issued last summer.
Q.: Could you tell us about the Russian decision to deploy strategic bombers to Crimean Peninsula? Why is it necessary?
A.: Frankly speaking, I am not following this in details. I hear this information for the first time from you. I am not saying it is not true but I am not aware of this. If such decision is taken which might be the case I do not see any problems with that, because of the increasing presence of NATO in the Black Sea. If you read Ukrainian press and listen to the statements, I think you would also deploy strategic bombers or whatever to protect this territory and guarantee that there will be no provocations of any kind. We have such a right since it is our territory.
Q.: Do you think it has anything to do with the deployment of the US strategic missiles?
A.: You must be much better expert on military issues than I am. I am a humble diplomat. But I cannot exclude such a link. You see the overall situation, which is not very favorable for disarmament. On the contrary, we are coming to the brink of arms race with all this situation about the INF Treaty and other agreements. Of course, we must be vigilant, and we need to take the steps that we want and have to take to protect our sovereignty and territory to avoid any provocations.
To conclude I wanted to present the Crimean Magazine I see most of you already have it. This is one of the Crimean media that we have received recently and we are happy to share it with you. It is very colorful and I read it with big pleasure. I recommend you to browse it and book your tickets to the Crimea. This is a unique place. Maybe at the next press-conference at the next anniversary you will also join and tell us a story of how you liked it in the Crimea and how people live there. We do not want to conceal this because we have nothing to regret in this regard, and we are now very joyful. Five years from this event have passed and we see that people in the Crimea are jubilant as well. That gives us forces to continue our policies and the way we do these things. Thank you everybody.
