Crimea - No annexation and legal in international law The jurist Reinhard Merkel, professor of Criminal Law and Philosophy of Law at the University of Hamburg, is sharply criticizing the German governments declarations on the Crimea Crisis. As Reinhard Merkel writes in a recent newspaper article, the first thing that must be clear is that the Crimeas integration into the Russian Federation had not constituted an annexation and no land grab. It was more in line with secession, ... confirmed by a referendum; ... which was followed by a demand for admission to the Russian Federation, which Moscow accepted. None of this was in violation of international law; the secession had merely been forbidden under Ukrainian law. To make this affirmation is in no way splitting hairs, but rather of great significance. Ultimately, an annexation, a theft of land by force, is nothing less than an act of war. Only two aspects, of what took place in the Crimea, were in violation of international law. On the one hand, the presence of Russian soldiers outside of their military installations, however, this has no effect on the referendums validity. The soldiers did not guard polling stations, only secured the possibility of the referendum and the secession occurring, by preventing the Ukrainian military from intervening under government orders to prohibit secession.” Look at Own Record Reinhard Merkel also points out that the West can hardly criticize the second violation of international law, i.e. recognition of secession after only two days. Admittedly, it is out of the question that this rapid recognition is in violation of Ukraines right to respect for its territorial integrity. However, the major Western powers, themselves, recognized the secession of Kosovo in February 2008, just as quickly - even though this, unlike the secession of the Crimea, actually had been a violation of (concrete) international law, namely, the UN Security Council Resolution 1244 of June 1999, which had guaranteed the inviolability of Serbias borders. Therefore, those angry Western governments should, now take a look at their own record. According to Reinhard Merkel, even though Russia had violated international law, it had done so in a modestly dramatic way and not at all with the politics of a gambling gangster. On the contrary, the integration of the Crimea has possibly with all its unpleasantness, prevented a more serious conflict.” Already in 2011, Reinhard Merkel had criticized NATOs war on Libya as a clear violation of international law. That breach of international law had led to innumerable war casualties and destroyed the Libyan government. (german-foreign-policy reported.[3])
Posted on: Tue, 15 Apr 2014 08:20:47 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015