Russia, as always, is keeping the doors for diplomacy and dialogue open:
Russia allows for unofficial visit of PACE delegation to Crimeahttp://www.rt.com/politics/311246-russia-allows-for-unofficial-visit/ A senior State Duma MP has said that Russia would look into possibility of the visit to Crimea by the head of PACE’s Social-Democratic caucus, Andreas Gross, albeit not within the remit of the Russia-PACE dialogue.
Aleksey Pushkov, chair of the lower house Committee for International Relations, told TASS that after Russian delegation withdrew its participation in PACE in protest of the sanctions imposed on it by this body, any official visits through PACE channels have become impossible.
However, Pushkov noted that Russian parliamentarians had not lost the contacts with their European colleagues.
“If Andreas Gross gathers a group of MPs representing not the Parliamentary Assembly, but their own national parliaments, from one or several nations, in this case, I think, this issue can be discussed,” he said.
Pushkov added that the visits of European politicians to Crimea was a mark of a new, more democratic approach to the choice of the Crimean people as earlier Europe had de facto refused the republic the right to choose their fate during what could be described as a coup in Kiev.
“Lawmakers from European countries who have already visited Crimea and who will go there in future are doing this to communicate with the people and form an impression about local thoughts and inclinations,” Pushkov told reporters.
At the same time, the leaders of European politics deliberately view the problem only from Kiev’s positions and forget about the fact that the population of the Crimean Republic amounts to 2.5 million who must have the right to express their opinion and determinate the fate of their country, he stated.
Pushkov said that European lawmakers who have already visited Crimea could be seen as protectors of traditional democratic values as European politicians have always emphasized the necessity to listen to ordinary people rather than governments alone. In addition, he expressed hope that visits to the region help to defuse the political crisis that emerged in connection of the region’s accession into the Russian Federation.
On July 23-24, a delegation of French lawmakers headed by MP Thierry Mariani visited Crimea and met with the head of the republic as well as with ordinary citizens. When the visit was completed, Mariani told reporters that he and his colleagues found the people in the region to be free and happy, especially about the fact that they did not have to face the same situation as the people in the war-torn southeastern regions of Ukraine that immediately border the Crimea.
The French lawmaker also said that in his opinion there were no grounds to keep the EU sanctions against Russia in place....
Here is more about the French visit:
Most Crimeans ‘happy to be back in Russia’ – head of French delegation to peninsula http://www.rt.com/news/310737-crimea-peaceful-french-mp/ The Crimean people “seem happy to be back in Russia,” said the deputy of the French National Assembly at a press conference in Moscow on Saturday, after paying a two-day visit to the region. The French delegation confirmed Crimea is a peaceful region.
A delegation of French lawmakers visited Crimea on July 23-24.
MP Thierry Mariani, who led the group of 10 politicians, said the citizens of Crimea were “reassured” they “don't have to face the same situation as the people who live in the regions of Lugansk and Donetsk” – the eastern areas of Ukraine devastated by war waged by the Kiev authorities against the rebels there.
Also:
Italian lawmakers announce plans for Crimea visit in October http://www.rt.com/politics/311052-italian-lawmakers-announce-plans-of/ A group of Italian MPs have decided to follow the example of their French colleagues to pay a personal visit to the Crimean Republic in order to get firsthand information on people’s lives and the political situation on the ground.
The organizer of the visit, MP Manlio Di Stefano, told Russian business daily Kommersant that the delegation would include between eight and 10 parliamentarians from the Five Star Movement, known for its Euroskeptic and anti-establishment stance.
Di Stefano also said that the delegation would be headed by a member of the parliamentary Committee for Foreign Relations, Alessandro di Batista, and that they had received an invitation from Russian MP Andrey Klimov, a member of the Foreign Relations Committee of the State Duma.
It seems Europe is starting to get tired of being pushed around by USA...
For some reason USA thought that they are exceptional, and that they'd succeed where the previous aggressors failed: