ANO, SPD and KSCM Support Russian Annexation of Crimea

Prague/Moscow, Dec 7 (CTK) – Czech Communist Party (KSCM) chairman Vojtech Filip today dismissed the information by Russian daily Izvestiya that the KSCM, apart from another Czech party, Freedom and Direct Democracy (SPD), is for Crimea to be recognised as part of Russia.

 

Publishing the information today, Izvestiya cited the KSCM’s press department and SPD deputy Jaroslav Holik and their opinion that the Russian annexation of Crimea is a fait accompli that occurred in accordance with international law.

 

Addressed by CTK, Holik said this is an idea the SPD deputies are yet to discuss.

 

“It is one of possible options. At present, it remains in the phase of a suggestion. We have to discuss it within our deputies’ group first,” Holik said.

 

“We are planning nothing like that,” Filip told CTK on behalf of the KSCM.

 

According to Izvestiya, the SPD group is going to propose an assessment of the Crimean issue by the lower house plenary session in the presence of “a Crimean delegation.”

 

A representative of the Czech government ANO movement said voices supporting the validity of the reuniting of Crimea and Russia have been heard in the Czech Republic more and more often, Izvestiya writes.

 

Holik confirmed to it the SPD’s plan to have the Crimean issue put on the Czech lower house agenda.

 

“Based on my personal experience, I am ready to defend the peninsula’s reuniting with Russia in Czech parliament. No occupation took place and most Crimean inhabitants welcome [Crimea’s] attachment to the Russian Federation. In our party, there has been agreement on the Crimea issue,” Izvestiya quotes Holik as saying.

 

He said the SPD wants to acquaint its fellow Czech deputies with the real situation in Crimea and win their support.

 

Afterwards, it would submit a proposal for the recognition of the legitimacy of the attachment of Crimea to Russia to the plenary session to vote on, Holik said.

 

“In addition, we want to address a joint appeal to the new [Czech] government. We are organising a Crimean delegation’s visit to Prague where it could assess the possibilities for political, economic and cultural cooperation,” he said.

 

The visit might take place in early 2018, he added.

 

The KSCM’s press department told Izvestiya that the annexation of Crimea by Russia in the spring of 2014 was provoked by the coup in Kiev, which was financed by the USA.

 

Crimea’s “uniting with Russia is a fait accompli that occurred in accordance with the international law,” Izvestiya quoted the KSCM as saying.

 

The ANO movement’s position was highlighted for the daily by ANO MP Stanislav Berkovec.

 

“The unsettled question of the status of Crimea prevents the establishment of relations between the western states and Russia… The events of March 2014 (occupation of Crimea by the Russian military) are not only a political but also a legal issue. The opinion that the process of Crimea’s attachment was in harmony with legal norms has been heard more and more often recently,” Berkovec said.