http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/26/world/europe/russia-ukraine-crimea-annexation.html?_r=0
excerpt
MOSCOW — A memo drafted in the weeks leading up to the collapse of the Ukrainian government last year recommended that Russia take advantage of the chaos next door to annex Crimea and a large portion of southeastern Ukraine,
a Russian newspaper reported on Wednesday, printing what it said was a
document that had been presented to the presidential administration.
Russia has long contended that it acted spontaneously to reclaim Crimea,
mainly to protect Russian speakers who it said were threatened, and to
stave off what it suspected was an attempt by NATO to colonize the Black
Sea region.
The report in Novaya Gazeta, one of the few often-critical voices still published in Russia, said that before the Ukrainian government collapsed on Feb. 21, 2014, the memo had already advised the Kremlin to adopt the policy it has since largely pursued in Ukraine.
The memo appears to have been drafted under the auspices of a conservative oligarch, Konstantin V. Malofeev, the report said. The memo laid out
what it called the inevitable disintegration of Ukraine and suggested a
series of logistical steps through which Russia could exploit the
situation for its own good — steps not far from what actually occurred,
though Russia has not annexed any territory in eastern Ukraine.
Sometime between Feb. 4 and Feb. 12 — while Russia was still voicing staunch support for its ally in Kiev, President Viktor F. Yanukovych
— the memo predicted Mr. Yanukovych’s overthrow and suggested that
Russia use the European Union’s own rules on self-determination to pry
away Crimea and a significant chunk of eastern Ukraine.
Dmitry
S. Peskov, the Kremlin spokesman, dismissed the memo as a hoax. “I
don’t know whether this document exists at all,” he said. “I don’t know
who might be the author, but for sure, the document has nothing to do
with the Kremlin.”
The
authenticity of the document could not be independently verified. The
newspaper did not publish any pictures of the memo or provide any proof
that the policy described in it had actually been adopted.
The
loss of Crimea had been a sore point in Moscow since the Soviet Union
collapsed in 1991. In addition, President Vladimir V. Putin suggested
last year that much of southeastern Ukraine, from Kharkiv to Odessa, actually formed a distinct area known in czarist times as New Russia.
That
talk faded as it became clear that only a minority of the population in
and around just two cities, Luhansk and Donetsk, had any interest in
joining Russia. But Russia has pushed for federalization of Ukraine,
another recommendation in the memo, since the beginning.
In
February, with the Yanukovych government teetering, the memo’s author
recommended that Russia take advantage of the “centrifugal forces”
tearing Ukraine apart to merge its east with Russia.
“The dominant regions for the application of force should be Crimea and the Kharkiv region,” it said, noting that strong groups there endorsed the idea of joining Russia....
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