Ukrainian Foreign Minister: We cannot draw parallels between Catalonia and the Crimea
Minister of Foreign Affairs of Ukraine Pavlo Klimkin believes that parallels should not be drawn between Catalonia, which declared independence from Spain, and annexed Crimea because of the absence of Russian troops in the first case.
"Imagine 2,000 Russian tanks and armored vehicles, thousands of Russian regular troops and tens of thousands of Russian mercenaries all in Catalina today. All this would be controlled by Russia... But in the sense of Russia's attempts to conduct a hybrid war against the whole of Europe to weaken it, we really have common challenges," Klimkin said at a joint press conference with the Spanish Minister of Foreign Affairs and Cooperation, Alfonso Dastis on October 30.
Spanish Foreign Minister Dastis added that the issue of Catalonia, the Crimea and the Donbas are threats to the territorial integrity of states.
The referendum on the independence of Catalonia was held on October 1. More than 90% of those voted were in favor of the withdrawal of the region from Spain. The turnout, according to the Catalan authorities, was 43%. Madrid called the vote illegal. The same opinion is held by the European Commission.
After the referendum, rallies with many thousands of participants were held in the region, both supporters and opponents of independence.
On March 16, 2014, a referendum was held in the Crimea and the city of Sevastopol, regarding the status of the peninsula, whose results made the Crimea part of Russian territory. Neither Ukraine, nor the European Union, nor the United States recognized this vote. On March 18, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the "accession" of the Crimea to Russia.