Surrounded by two seas, the Black Sea to the west and south, and the Sea of Azov to the east, and acting as the border between the western world and the Pontic-Caspian steppe, Crimea has been a disputed territory for centuries. Romans, Goths, Byzantines, Cumans and Slavs all wanted to control this much-coveted peninsula. In 2014, Crimea, which was Ukrainian territory at the time, was illegally annexed by Russia, which eight years later went on to launch a large-scale invasion of neighbouring Ukraine.
Romania, which unconditionally supports Ukraine, will maintain its firm position to condemn and not to recognise the illegal annexation by the Russian Federation of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol, said Romania’s foreign ministry. It also reiterated support for Ukraine’s independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity within its internationally recognised borders. The Romanian foreign office said this annexation represents a „strong violation of international law and the multilateral agreements Russia is part of, including the Charter of the United Nations and the Helsinki Final Act”. Romania also condemns the use by the Russian armed forces of the territory of Crimea in the context of Russia’s illegal and unprovoked war of aggression launched against the neighbouring Ukraine on 24th February 2022.
A statement from the Romanian foreign ministry says Romania reiterates that it also does not recognise the illegal annexation by the Russian Federation of four regions in the east of Ukraine, Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, which, according to Bucharest, are an indivisible part of the national territory of Ukraine under international law. EFE notes that with the illegal annexation of these four regions last September, Russia has transformed the Sea of Azov into its own internal sea, thus ensuring the security of Crimea, which has also become a line of defence.
For its part, Ukraine says it will win back the occupied territory. Since 2020, it has marked the Day of Resistance to the Occupation of Crimea and Sevastopol on 26th February, the date of the biggest demonstration to support the integrity and unity of the Ukrainian state in Simferopol, Crimea’s administrative centre, in 2014. In August 2021, Kyiv launched the Crimea Platform in an attempt to gather international support to regain the peninsula and which, in the last year, has requested Russia to immediately end hostilities and withdraw its troops from the occupied territories in Ukraine.
(Leyla Cheamil, Radio Romania International)
