Appeal to all our friends and partners

Dear friends and partners,

we would like to address you today with regard to the rough violation of the Constitution of Ukraine, all possible national and international laws and agreements brought about by the so called “Referendum” in Crimea that will take place tomorrow, March 16. Now, we come to speak true about current situation in Ukraine in opposite to the mass of lie erupted by the Russian propaganda.

First of all we want to assure you that there are no harassments of the minorities in Ukraine, no conflicts with Russian speaking people, no prerequisites for “support” of foreign military forces. People all over Ukraine organize mass demonstrations to support the unity of Ukraine, to show that Ukrainians are one nation and would like to live in their country in peace and build a new, prosperous, democratic country that protects the rights of all of its citizens.

Pro-European, pro-democratic vector of Ukraine is very dangerous for Mr. Putin in economic, political and geo-political senses. That is why Russian soldiers, violating of all international laws and agreements, have occupied Crimea, the Constitutional territory of Ukraine and overtook the parliament of Crimea. After that the parliament of Crimea had to appoint a new “prime-minister” of that territory at gunpoint, whose party hardly gained 1 % of votes in Crimea during the last elections to the Ukrainian parliament in 2012. Then the Russian army occupied the territory of the peninsular and blocked all the military bases of Ukraine. Following the orders of the new “leader” of Crimea and with the “help” of the Russian soldiers, the Crimean parliament appointed a referendum, at first for May, then for April, then for March 16, that is in ten days after the decision was taken. This “referendum” was proclaimed non-constitutional by the Venetian Commission at the Council of Europe, by all the leaders of the democratic world except Russia. Russia used its right to veto the decision of the United Nations Security Council directly opposing the rest of the world, showing that their imperial idea is more important that peace, law and common sense.

Russia goes even beyond that. Specially trained people, Russian citizens were brought to the eastern parts of Ukraine to arrange pro-Russian demonstrations. These people are aggressive; they have killed several participants of the peaceful pro-Ukrainian demonstration in Donetsk, attacked and injured pro-Ukrainian people in Kharkiv etc. Russian mass-media and government, who have been distorting Ukrainian news starting with the Maidan events, used these staged atrocities as a pretext to issue more “help” to Russian people in Ukraine, to “protect” them as it is being done in Crimea. In other words, they say that they are ready to start massive military intervention into Ukraine. This situation borders on madness and cannot be be given any reasonable explanation or justification.

We understand that the position of Mr. Puttin and his supporters is not the position of all people in Russia. Numerous demonstrations have taken place in the Russian Federation today. Thousands of people peacefully showed their protest against war and Russian occupation of Ukraine and we are grateful to them for this. Such demonstrations are taking place in Crimea too. But is not easy to protest under the guns and pro-Ukrainian people were beaten, attacked and kidnapped by Russian “cossacks” and pro-russian activists.

Ukrainian military forces showed the top level of calmness and wisdom in Crimea, sometimes showing heroism, going to negotiation with Russians weaponless while the occupants were shooting at them. Only the sober-minded position of the Ukrainian political leaders, military forces and international community has helped to avoid war so far.
We ask all our friends and partners abroad to trust us and support the people of Ukraine. Ukrainians have enough wisdom and patriotism to protect our country against external aggression and to protect our right to live in a free, democratic country but we hope that this situation will be sorted out peacefully. We hope that leaders of your countries will act strongly and decisively as millions of lives and peace in Europe and the whole world depend on them now.