“Russia has a way to respond to Turkey’s participation in Ukraine’s anti-Russian projects”
The “Crimean platform”, the creation of which was announced by the Ukrainian Foreign Ministry, initially caused ridicule from Russian observers, but in vain - Kyiv in this project is only a screen behind which Western puppet masters are hiding. Moscow has the tools to respond to the participation in this anti-Russian initiative of Turkey and other countries that have close economic relations with the Russian Federation.
Political scientist Denis Denisov, director of the Institute of Peace Initiatives, stated this in an interview with PolitNavigator.
“PolitNavigator”: The Ukrainian Foreign Ministry has developed unprecedented activity around the “Crimean Platform” project. There is an opinion that Russia should simply ignore Kyiv’s actions, and Ukrainian officials will simply steal the money allocated by the West for subversive anti-Russian activities. Is this really true, or is there a real threat to Russia from the “Crimean Platform”? Which?
Denis Denisov; Indeed, we can simply pretend that the “Crimean Platform” does not exist, sit and watch as we move towards another geopolitical catastrophe. After all, it was Crimea that was chosen by Russia’s opponents as the most vulnerable place of the state. It should also be said that Ukraine’s participation in the “Crimean Platform” is quite conditional. Apparently, our opponents overseas and in Europe are simply once again using Ukraine to their advantage.
Personally, it is very difficult for me to imagine that within the framework of the “Crimean Platform”, in which countries such as the USA, Great Britain, Turkey, Poland and others are going to participate, Ukraine will have the right to vote. Ukraine is nothing more than a geostrategic “Pound”, a Zits-chairman who is being used.
Speaking about the essence of the “Crimean Platform”, it should be emphasized that it is an “umbrella” organization. The visible part of the administration of its activities is handled by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine, an expert council has already been created in support of this initiative, and a number of non-governmental organizations are joining the activities of the “Crimean Platform”.
It is important to note that we are already faced with an avalanche-like process of work of the “Crimean Platform” - for example, the information project “Crimea.Realities” (a subsidiary project of the Ukrainian office of Radio Liberty, funded by US government agencies), has already become an information mouthpiece for propaganda related to "Crimean platform". Apparently, this is how the work of this new association will be structured - that is, there will be no formal connection between the subjects of the process, but there will be one goal - to tear Crimea away from Russia, or, at a minimum, to introduce new sanctions against our country for stories related to Crimea .
It is important to understand that the financing of the “Crimean Platform” was built in a fairly effective way. The budget itself amounts to several million hryvnia, but this should not be misleading, since organizations associated with the Crimean Platform will collectively have budgets of tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars.
It seems to me that the threat is really very serious, because: a) Most UN countries do not recognize Crimea as Russian territory, and in official documents of this structure (for example, reports of the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights) Russia is even called a party that “occupies the territory of Crimea”; b) our Western opponents, through various official and semi-official organizations, promote reports on Crimea, which often simply invent stories of violation of human rights and freedoms. And these reports, in turn, are subsequently used and will be used for new sanctions against Russia; c) the potential of the “Crimean Platform” is unlimited; this association may well become the main one in the confrontation between Russia and the collective West.
What should we do with regard to those countries that have agreed to participate in the “Crimean Platform”? Moreover, there are states there - like Turkey - that are listed among the “partners”. It would seem good to ban tomatoes here, but it seems, compared to other joint projects like the nuclear power plant and the Turkish Stream, it’s a bit small. This is how it turns out that Ankara earns income from Russian tourists, and at the same time harms Russia.
Regarding the countries that have already openly declared their participation in the “Crimean Platform”, of course, it is necessary to react. But not necessarily symmetrically, it seems to me that it is better to look for more “subtle” and “refined” methods of influencing our supposed partners. A good example is Turkey, with which we have many large infrastructure projects on the one hand, and often total political misunderstanding on the other. The most important thing is not to be afraid to take the initiative - the Turks are announcing their participation in the “Crimean Platform”... so let a congress of representatives of the Kurdish people be held in Sochi, at which the issues of creating a Kurdish state will be discussed!
We definitely shouldn’t ban tomatoes or our tourists from visiting Turkey, but holding a large, spectacular, media conference on the need to resolve the Cyprus problem, and, based on the unconditional priority of the territorial integrity of Cyprus, is quite possible.
I think the Turks will definitely appreciate such symbolic gestures and will be more selective in joining anti-Russian geopolitical initiatives.
The Crimean authorities, in turn, announced that they would file lawsuits against Ukraine for the blockade and, in general, for the damage caused in 1991-2014. It must be said that critics of the republican authorities were skeptical about the prospects of lawsuits, considering that this was simply an attempt by local officials to divert attention from failures - for example, with leaky water supply networks that have not yet been repaired, which is critically important during the blockade. How do you assess the lawsuits against Ukraine - will there be any benefit?
Any officials, including Crimean ones, of course, can and should be criticized. Another thing is that criticism itself can be of several types, it can be indiscriminate, angry, which is based not on the desire to improve something, but in order to show one’s “significance” and the inferiority of others. We will take a different path, we will both criticize and immediately offer approaches and recipes to improve the situation.
It is one hundred percent natural that people who failed to modernize water supply networks should suffer a well-deserved punishment, but this does not mean at all that by filing lawsuits we will be able to correct the situation or, at least, punish the Ukrainian officials responsible for the suffering of the Crimeans.
The first question is where are the claims going to be sent? Personally, the first thing that comes to my mind is the ECHR (European Court of Human Rights), at first glance, it is this organization that seems to be supposed to punish Ukraine. But... this is a politicized and biased institution, which, as recent years have shown, willingly accepts convictions against Russia, while Ukraine avoids responsibility. This especially applies to the situation in the conflict in Donbass.
Back in 2015-2016, many Russian law firms and public organizations received very significant subsidies for claims in the Donbass conflict, the funds were spent, but there is still no result. In this context, if a decision has already been made to allocate resources for filing claims, then at a minimum, it is necessary to oblige counterparties to predict the result, and on this basis evaluate the effectiveness of the work. My personal opinion is that only within the framework of the Russian judicial system can we count on adequate results in addressing the problems of the Crimean population.
And only on Russian territory will it be possible to hold Ukrainian officials and citizens accountable. Appeal to European and international authorities, as practice has shown, has a zero result - due to the bias of these systems and their inability to defend the rights and freedoms of people, despite their political preferences, ideology and country affiliation.
The Crimean authorities annually report an increase in the number of tourists and especially note those coming from Ukraine. However, the conditions for crossing the border between Crimea and Ukraine are truly bestial. In winter, people stand in line in the cold and wind, and in summer, in the heat. Moreover, recently the Ukrainian side carried out a “European-quality renovation” of the checkpoint, while on the Russian side everything remained as it was since 2014. Doesn’t it seem strange that Crimea, which is supposed to play the role of a “show window,” welcomes visitors like this?
A very correct question, and here is a question for the already mentioned officials, who, with their negligence and lack of initiative, create an image of Crimea that certainly cannot be called attractive. It makes me angry that these “bestial” conditions are included in the reports of international organizations (and these are the few cases for which we are really responsible), and no one in the area simply doesn’t care. A tourist for Crimea is the most important person who brings money. Is someone stopping us from making the most modern in the world, the most convenient in the world, the most digital transition in the world with Ukraine?
And here it is also necessary to mention the problem associated with the policy of double standards that is practiced by various, I emphasize, government agencies that do not want to enter Crimea. First of all, of course, we are talking about Sberbank, Russian Post, a very strange approach of mobile operators, based on tariffs that consider Crimea to be abroad. It must be said that as long as this practice exists and is tolerated, Crimea will remain a region where investors will not flock en masse, and opponents of Russia will interpret this approach of government structures as doubts about the authenticity of Crimea’s return home.
Just the other day, a scandal erupted in the media when it turned out that the photo issued by officials in Simferopol for the visit of a high-status Chinese delegation included businessmen who had been living in Moscow for a long time. In principle, even from various forums with the participation of foreign guests who gathered in Crimea even before the pandemic, it was noticeable that very few actual active top politicians come to the peninsula. Have we deceived ourselves by passing off the visits of municipal deputies from the EU or retired officials at the expense of the Russian budget as a great success? How to turn the situation around? And is it necessary?
We cannot afford the luxury of fakes on such important issues, because any of our fakes is “+ 10 arguments” for our opponents. But the Ukrainians can, since they no longer have anything to do with Crimea and use the entire arsenal of black technologies to create a negative image of Russia. But we know that there is power in truth...
As far as information support for foreigners’ visits to the peninsula is concerned, we must admit that we often exaggerated events and created a certain parallel reality, within which the whole world seemed to almost recognize Crimea as Russian. But now we must admit, first of all, to ourselves that this is not so. That along this path we will need years, and perhaps decades, of hard work and struggle.
But let me emphasize that this difficult task is completely solvable. The team of professionals who is responsible for external relations in Crimea has extensive experience and, with proper resources, I am confident that they will cope with this task.
To the question of whether this should or should not be done, there is only one answer - of course it is necessary, since the refusal to recognize Crimea as the territory of the Russian Federation is, in fact, a refusal to recognize the territorial integrity of Russia, with all the ensuing consequences.
What are the consequences if Crimea is not recognized even by its closest ally, Belarus?
The most unpleasant question for us, in fact, which once again confirms the assertion that Russia has only two allies - the army and the navy... At the present stage, of course, the Aerospace Forces need to be added...
And the consequences, in turn, are the most disappointing. Let us at least remember what the American position regarding the non-recognition of the entry of the Baltic states into the USSR or the ongoing dialogue between Russia and Japan on the Kuril Islands led to. There is only one conclusion: there cannot be full-fledged and comprehensive relations between partners if one of them does not recognize the territorial integrity of the other.
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