False flag operations in 2014

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What happened before

In the 2004 Ukrainian presidential election, the pro-Russian andidate Viktor Fedorovich Yanukovich (°1950) initially emerged as the winner. However, the election results were not accepted by a large part of the population, which led to the Orange Revolution. The results were eventually declared invalid and new elections were held. These were won by the pro-European Viktor Andriovich Yushchenko (°1954). The election was seriously disrupted when the face of the charismatic Yushchenko's was disfigured as a result of dioxin poisoning.

Anyway, in the 2010 elections, the pro-Russian Yanukovich was elected president after all.

In November 2013, following pressure from Russia, Yanukovich refused to ratify the association agreement with the European Union, which had been initiated by his predecessor Yushchenko, and opted instead for closer economic relations with Russia. Ukraine then became the scene of large-scale demonstrations, which were initially pro-European, but in January 2014 increasingly took on the character of a popular uprising against the Yanukovich government.

On 21 February 2014, President Yanukovich disappeared from Kyiv, first to flee to Kharkiv, then to Crimea and finally to Russia.


Uniforms without insignia

At the end of February, armed gangs began to seize government buildings in Crimea. They wore uniforms without insignia. According to the Kremlin, they were Ukrainian rebels, but it was clear to everyone that they were Russian soldiers who had crossed the border on February 22 and 23. By denying that they were Russian soldiers, Putin misled not only the outside world, but also his own population, for it was not until March 1, 2014, that Putin received permission from the Russian Federation Council to deploy Russian armed forces in Ukraine

In April, several armed groups, again dressed in uniforms without insignia, began to seize territory in the Donetsk and Luhansk provinces in eastern Ukraine – the so-called Donbas. These were again Russian soldiers posing as local self-defense forces. The Kremlin has consistently denied that it was involved in the conflict. However, these troops were led by military expert Igor Vsevolodovich Girkin (°1970), also known as Igor Strelkov, who until the year before had been a colonel in the secret service FSB.

In his own country, it was becoming increasingly difficult for Putin to keep Russia’s involvement a secret.. Every day, Russian soldiers were dying in this «non-existent war». Their bodies were being transported back to Russia in trucks as Груз 200 [Groez 200] or Cargo 200 convoys. Cargo 200 is the code commonly used in Russia for repatriating dead bodies from the battlefield. Boris Yefimovich Nemtsov (1959–2015), once deputy prime minister under President Boris Nikolaevich Yeltsin (1931–2007), was assassinated shortly after he had announced that he would publish a report on the Russian involvement in Ukraine under the title Путин. Война. [Putin. Voyna] or Putin. War. After Nemtsov's death, some of his colleagues completed the report and distributed it online.

Click here to download Nemtsov's report

The rebels shot down Malaysian Airlines flight MH17 on July 17, killing 298 people. They were trained by the same Girkin, who was sentenced to life imprisonment in absentia by the court in The Hague, the Netherlands, on November 17, 2022.

The fighting between the rebels and the Ukrainian army intensified, Ukraine redoubled its offensive and the rebels seemed on the verge of being overrun. In August, however, the Kremlin threw off its masks and Russia escalated from covertly supporting the rebels to openly invading the country with Russian military forces.

The Russian law does not provide for the unilateral accession of parts of foreign states to the Russian Federation. According to the Russian Constitution, the admission of new federal subjects is regulated by federal constitutional law (Article 65.2).

In order to proceed with a formal legal annexation and inclusion in the Russian state system of the Ukrainian territories, Crimea had to first declare independence, receive Russia's recognition, and then submit a request for accession based on a referendum. This procedure was also used in 2022 in Russia's annexation of the Ukrainian oblasts of Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk, and Zaporizhia.

 

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