(2016-10-09) Litvinenko, Denis; Colton, Timothy; Ostrowski, Donald
This thesis examines Crimea’s 2014 unilateral declaration of independence and subsequent absorption by Russia. It examines the region’s volatile history and attempts to present a balanced view of the positions of the main actors involved: Crimeans, Ukraine, Russia, Crimea’s Tatar minority, and the international community. It presents a host of legal opinions on the issue, trying to answer whether Russia’s annexation of the peninsula can be considered legal under international law.
Virtually all Western (or at least English-speaking) analysts declare the 2014 referendum illegal under international law, even though most of them also admit that there is no legal precedent to support or overturn such a verdict. This admission brings us to the ultimate answer – without a clear legal precedent in international law, Crimea’s independence from Ukraine was no more or no less legal than Ukraine’s own independence from the Soviet Union twenty-three years prior.
