Comparing secession of Kosovo and Crimea

2014-03-10 David L. Phillips

Tim Peters from the CDU pointed to:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-l-phillips/crimea-is-not-kosovo_b_4936365.html

After replying to him, he did cancel the "friendship" in Facebook. CDU and Greens seem not to like discussions. Anyway, thanks for the link!

/Russia is pointing to the "Kosovo precedent" as justification for its actions in Crimea./ - Where did it? There is the 2nd chapter in http://www.faz.net/aktuell/politik/ausland/europa/krim-krise-putin-brueskiert-die-serben-12832912.html which mentions the position of Putin, that "nur die Bürger, die in einem bestimmten Territorium leben, über deren Zukunft bestimmen können" (only the citizens that live in a certain territory can determine the future [of the territory, or the people? article is unclear]) -> Probably a false claim.

/Kosovo's independence is based on international law; Russia's annexation of Crimea is not./ - As of 2014-03-10 there is no annexation.

/Yugoslavia's 1974 constitution established Kosovo as an autonomous province with the same rights as Yugoslavia's republics, which included the right to secession./ - Since the province was part of the republic of Serbia this is impossible. -> False claim.
- http://www.icty.org/x/cases/slobodan_milosevic/trans/en/041201IT.htm Page 33993: "The 1974 constitution gave the province practically all of the functions which the republics had. Not all of them but practically all of them in the Yugoslavia at the time."
- Page 33995: "The constitution of 1974 practically denied Serbia all rights in Kosovo. The province became practically equal to the republic, both the province of Kosovo and the province of Vojvodina. There were only two differences: One was that the constitution in Serbia had Article 300, making for some singular or united solutions for the whole of the republic; and the second was that the Council of States and Republics had 12 delegates while the number of deputies from the provinces were eight. This was a symbolic difference in the numbers, but the rights that these delegations had were absolutely the same, both in the federal Chamber, there were 30 and 20 deputies."
- Page 34006: "For instance, the citizenship of the Republic of Serbia, because there was no citizenship of the province; right?" - "Right." ... "They wanted to demonstrate that the province was practically a republic. They wanted to put a mark of equality between the province and the republic." ... province wants to grant citizenship to immigrants coming from Albania.
- Page 34013: "What they wanted was secession from Serbia. They wanted Kosovo to become a republic."
- Page 34043: "Mr. Jokanovic, for the Assembly of Serbia to be able to pass these amendments, it was necessary to receive the approval of both provinces; is that so?" - "Yes." - "Was it necessary to have the approval of the Republic of Serbia for provincial assemblies to pass amendments?" - "No. Serbia's approval was not necessary. Provinces could change their constitutions independently."

/which included the right to secession/ -> any trustworthy citation?

/Kosovars exercised their constitutional right to secede in a 1992 referendum./ -> any trustworthy citation?

2014-10-13 Anatoly Vorobey

/at least because in one place was protracted civil war, and the other does not. / - there will always be some differences between two situations in two territories. But, as far as international law and "legality" are concerned, how are they different? Should the Crimeans start a civil war first to get their referendum accepted by the EU/NATO/USA?