I think everyone can agree that international law and treaties should not be completely jettisoned?
Budapest Memo was violated by Ukraine and US and UK, when they supported the violent coup that overthrew its democratically elected government and completely changed the politics of the nation. (Even if the coup were on one level valid - due to Yanukovych's corruption.)
On the other hand, Crimea declared independence, and so Russia did not violate the Budapest Memorandum. What really pisses off the West is that Russia made sure Crimea could hold a vote and declare independence - if Ukraine could have, it would have stopped Crimea from doing so. But still, it was Crimea's decision, a democratic one.
The most you can accuse Russia of is ensuring that a democratic decision could be reached. Whereas the US/UK sponsored a non-democratic, violent coup.
Quoting: Sun_dancer No, Russia was the one that broke the Budapest Memo. First by using economic coercion against Ukraine to prevent Yanukovych from signing the free trade agreement with the EU.
Then Russia broke it again by violating Ukraine's territorial integrity - sending troops in Crimea, deposing the governor of Crimea and replacing him with a puppet who then organized the referendum. Then annexing Crimea.
And your shilling for Russia is so fucking obvious....
What economic sanctions did Russia use, and how did they violate the Budapest Memorandum? Do you mean Russia proposing a favorable trade deal with Ukraine constitutes the use or threatened use of force against Ukraine's political independence? WTF? And the Budapest Memorandum basically just copies international law - it is a violation to use force against any country's political indepenedenc. See Article 2(4) of UN Charter at [
link to www.un.org] .
So are you saying everytime US proposes favorable trade terms on conditions, it is violating international law? Or is there some special rule that requires Russia to give favorable trade terms to those hostile to it?
Now by the time anything happened in Crimea, the US/UK had already violated the Budapest Memorandum, as had the Ukrainian government itself when it seized power by force. So when you have a contract, and one party violates it, the other party need no longer comply. For example: if you have a lease for an apartment, and the landlord (in violation of the lease) kicks you out, you no longer must pay rent. This is obvious.
But beyond that, where is your evidence that Russia violated Ukraine's territorial integrity? "Territorial integrity" does not mean what you seem to think - see [
link to www.princeton.edu] .
Like I said, Russia did support Crimea's ability to hold a referendum. You can make an argument that this violated Ukraine's territorial integrity but I don't buy it, since the only threatened use of force was against Ukraine stopping the democratic vote. In this regard, I would compare Kosovo, where NATO also used the threat of force to permit Kosovo to declare independence, and this was found to be legal by the International Court of Justice.
