The Russian President’s attempt to detach Crimea from Ukraine is a repetition of what he tried to do in Georgia during the Russian-Georgian war of 2008. And, once again, this unscrupulous little man is making the same excuse: to protect Crimea’s ethnic Russians and Russian-speaking majorities. This time, however, Vladimir Putin’s regime has to rebut international condemnation for his actions.

Within a few days, Putin brought the peninsula on the Black Sea under his grip. Pro-Russian sentiment is very much alive in Sevastopol, the historic base of Russia’s Black Sea fleet, thus enabling the Russian master of political intrigues to gain easy access to Crimea.

Pro-Russian separatism in Crimea and most of all in Sevastopol emerged late in the 1990s. However, Boris Yeltsin made it a point to keep good relations with Ukraine when, in 1997, during his presidency, he cut a deal with the country under which the Ukrainian government authorised the Black Sea fleet to stay in Sevastopol until 2017, an arrangement which, in 2010, was extended to 2042 by the ousted pro-Russian president, Viktor Yanukovych!

Under the unlimited, authoritarian power of Putin, who is acting in Crimea with a vengeance, the future of the Ukrainian State is in question.

A decision needs to be taken as soon as possible... and another chapter in Crimea’s turbulent history will be written.