I am deeply alarmed by the Russian Federation Council’s approval of President Putin’s request to deploy Russian troops in Ukraine.

There is no justification whatsoever for external military interference.  Indeed, military intervention would be an unambiguous violation of the UN Charter, the Helsinki Final Act and the Budapest Memorandum on Security Assurances.

Indeed, in the Budapest Memorandum signed in 1994 upon Ukraine’s formal renunciation of nuclear weapons, Russia – along with the United Kingdom and the United States – specifically reaffirmed “their obligation to refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of Ukraine”.  They also undertook to “refrain from economic coercion designed to subordinate to their own interest the exercise by Ukraine of the rights inherent in its sovereignty.”

There should be no further military posturing, no threats to Ukraine’s territorial integrity, and certainly no military intervention, which would be both illegal and unjustified. 

Now is the time for dialogue and statesmanship, not military adventurism.

 

NATO PA Press Release http://www.nato-pa.int/default.asp?CAT2=0&CAT1=0&CAT0=0&SHORTCUT=3401