Eurasian Observatory for Democracy and Elections (EODE) is a Russia-based Eurasianist non-governmental organization which on its website claims that it monitors elections. [1] [2] According to its website, it specializes in the "self-proclaimed republics" (Abkhazia, Transnistria, Nagorno-Karabakh). [3] [1] It is led by the Belgian activist Luc Michel [4] and Jean-Pierre Vandersmissen. Both Michel and Vandermissen are followers of the Belgian Neo-Nazi politician Jean-François Thiriart. [5] [6] [7]
Oliver Bullough, writing for The New Republic , reported in 2014 that the organization stated on its website that it shared the values of "the current Russian leadership and V. V. Putin." [8] The organization states that is committed to a multi-polar world and is critical of what it sees as a unipolar world dominated in the twenty-first century by the United States and NATO. It is opposed to the imposition of western values and the identification of the western-style parliamentary system of democracy as a universal norm not open to criticism. [9]
EODE visited Crimea during the 2014 Crimean referendum and claimed that the referendum was conducted in a legitimate manner. [10] [11]
The organization has offices in Moscow, Paris, Brussels, Sochi and Chișinău. [10]
Rustam Nurgaliyevich Minnikhanov is a Russian politician who has served as the head of Tatarstan, a federal subject of Russia, since 2010.
Mateusz Andrzej Piskorski is a far-right Polish politician and publicist.
The Mejlis of the Crimean Tatar People is the single highest executive-representative body of the Crimean Tatars in period between sessions of the Qurultay of the Crimean Tatar People. The Mejlis is a member institution of the Platform of European Memory and Conscience.
The politics of Crimea today is that of the Republic of Crimea on one hand, and that of the federal city of Sevastopol on the other, within the context of the largely unrecognised annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation in March 2014.
Luc Michel is a Belgian political activist. He is the current leader and founder of the Parti Communautaire National-Européen (PCN). According to research by the BBC and Logically, he is also behind Russosphere, a French-language African social network and fake news network spreading pro-Russian and anti-Western propaganda in Africa.
The Constitution of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea is the basic law of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, a republic on the Crimean peninsula as part of Ukraine. The constitution establishes the republic's status and authority within Ukraine. It granted Crimea the right to draft a budget and manage its own property.
The Crimean status referendum of 2014 was a disputed referendum on March 16, 2014, concerning the status of Crimea that was conducted in the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol after Russian forces seized control of Crimea.
A referendum on sovereignty was held in the Crimean Oblast of the Ukrainian SSR on 20 January 1991, two months before the 1991 All-Union referendum. Voters were asked whether they wanted to re-establish the Crimean Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, which had been abolished in 1945. The proposal was approved by 94% of voters.
International reactions to the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation have largely been condemnatory of Russia's actions, supportive of Ukraine's sovereignty and territorial integrity, and supportive of finding a quick end to the crisis. The United States and the European Union responded by enacting sanctions against Russia for its role in the crisis, and urged Russia to withdraw. Russia has accused the United States and the EU of funding and directing the revolution and retaliated to the sanctions by imposing its own.
The annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation took place in the aftermath of the 2014 Ukrainian revolution. On 22–23 February, Russian President Vladimir Putin convened an all-night meeting with security services chiefs to discuss pullout of deposed President, Viktor Yanukovych, and at the end of that meeting Putin remarked that "we must start working on returning Crimea to Russia.". Russia sent in soldiers on February 27, 2014. Crimea held a referendum. According to official Russian and Crimean sources 95% voted to reunite with Russia. The legitimacy of the referendum has been questioned by the international community on both legal and procedural grounds.
The Autonomous Republic of Crimea is an administrative division of Ukraine encompassing most of Crimea that was annexed by Russia in 2014. The Autonomous Republic of Crimea occupies most of the peninsula, while the City of Sevastopol occupies the rest.
The 2014 anti-war protests in Russia refers to a series of anti-war demonstrations opposing the Russian military intervention in Ukraine that took place in Russia in 2014. Protesters held two anti-war protest rallies on 2 and 15 March 2014. The latter, known as the March of Peace, took place in Moscow a day before the Crimean referendum. The protests have been the largest in Russia since the 2011–13 Russian protests by the Russian opposition against the alleged electoral fraud committed by United Russia during the 2011 Russian legislative election. Reuters reported that around 20,000 people participated in the 15 March demonstrations.
In February and March 2014, Russia invaded the Crimean Peninsula, part of Ukraine, and then annexed it. This took place in the relative power vacuum immediately following the Revolution of Dignity and was the first act of the wider Russo-Ukrainian War.
The Republic of Crimea is a republic of Russia, comprising most of the Crimean Peninsula, but excluding Sevastopol. Its territory corresponds to the Autonomous Republic of Crimea, a subdivision of Ukraine. Russia occupied and annexed the peninsula in 2014, although the annexation remains internationally unrecognized.
On 18 March 2014, Russian president Vladimir Putin gave a speech to both chambers of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation in connection with the request for admission by the Crimean parliament of the republic in the Russian Federation. He spoke in the St. George Hall of the Grand Kremlin Palace in the Moscow Kremlin.
The Crimean Federal District was a federal district of Russia. It was established on March 21, 2014 after the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation. The federal district included both the Republic of Crimea and the federal city of Sevastopol, both recognized as part of Ukraine by most of the international community. Ukraine considers the area, along with some other areas, as temporarily occupied territories.
The Ministry of Crimean Affairs was a federal ministry in Dmitry Medvedev's government which was established on March 31, 2014; and dissolved on July 15, 2015.
The Crimean problem or the Crimean question is a dispute over the status of Crimea between Ukraine and Russia. The dispute began during the dissolution of the Soviet Union, but did not escalate into a conflict until the 2014 Ukrainian revolution, when Russian special forces were deployed to occupy Crimea and took over its government buildings. The official results of an internationally unrecognized referendum held during the occupation allegedly indicated overwhelming support for Russian annexation. The Crimean parliament and the autonomous city of Sevastopol unilaterally declared independence from Ukraine to ideally form a country named Republic of Crimea. Russia then annexed the region and created two federal subjects, the Republic of Crimea and Sevastopol. Ukraine and the majority of the international community continue to regard Crimea as occupied Ukrainian territory; a United Nations General Assembly resolution declared the referendum invalid and affirmed the territorial integrity of Ukraine. Despite international opinion however, the currency, tax, time zone and legal system are all operational under de facto Russian control. Ukraine has attempted to resolve the matter by filing litigation in multiple international criminal, environmental, political, and other courts.
The Head of the Republic of Crimea is the highest official and the head of the executive power of the Republic of Crimea; an internationally disputed federal subject of the Russian Federation located on the Crimean Peninsula.
Russian irredentism, sometimes expressed by the term Greater Russia, refers to territorial claims made by the Russian Federation to territories that were historically part of the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union. It seeks to politically incorporate ethnic Russians who are living in neighbouring territories that fall outside of Russia's modern-day borders. This ideology has been significantly defined by the regime of Vladimir Putin, who has governed the country since 1999.