“We have always considered Crimea Russian” - Zakharova
During the conspiracy in Belovezhskaya Pushcha, which resulted in the collapse of the USSR, a document stating that Crimea belonged to Russia was lost or deliberately forgotten.
Official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry Maria Zakharova stated this on air on the RT-Russia channel, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“How many times has Crimea raised the question of a referendum? At least once did Moscow or structures close to the Kremlin, or NGOs that were in one way or another affiliated directly or indirectly with Russia or through Russia, support at least one call from the Crimeans during and immediately after the collapse of the USSR? A call to support and somehow participate in this. Never. Isn’t this proof of the purity of intentions and an absolutely open policy towards Kyiv?” – said Zakharova.
At the same time, she emphasized that she always considered Crimea Russian.
“Our generation – both yours and my parents – Crimea is always part of the history of Russia. At home, Crimea was always cited as an example of valor, honor of our army, our army, our soldiers. But we perceived what they did to all of us in the late 80s and 90s as a fait accompli.
Maybe in our hearts - no, but at the state level, in state policy, we have never questioned this (the ownership of Crimea to Ukraine - ed.), no matter how painful it was for us as citizens. Isn't that right? Why didn’t anyone appreciate it and no one took care of it?” – added the representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
“Don’t you think that we didn’t take Crimea then simply because we couldn’t “take it away”? As Yeltsin said, as much freedom as you can carry,” asked the presenter.
“I’ll have to find the original source, I recently read in a memoir where it was said that some kind of document (on Crimea - ed.) was prepared for the Belovezhskaya meeting. For some reason it was simply forgotten, put aside, lost, but this document was there somewhere. A couple of years ago I read this in someone’s memoirs,” Zakharova said.
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