Ukraine: Russia Mediation Proposal ‘Unacceptable’

Russia Recognizes Crimean Independence

After a solid week of US officials berating them, Russian officials came to the table with Ukraine’s interim government, offering a proposal of “mediation.”

The proposal included calls for dramatic revisions to the Ukrainian constitution, something US officials had also endorsed yesterday. Despite this, Ukrainian officials reacted with outrage, and condemned the proposal as “unacceptable.”

The Russian proposal sought the constitutional revision to grant broad levels of autonomy to individual provinces within the country, and also to cement the nation as permanently neutral militarily.

Ukrainian officials are more interested in railing at the Crimean referendum yesterday, though that seems to be a done deal, with an overwhelming majority backing accession into the Russian Federation and Russia formally recognizing their independence.

Author: Jason Ditz

Jason Ditz is Senior Editor for Antiwar.com. He has 20 years of experience in foreign policy research and his work has appeared in The American Conservative, Responsible Statecraft, Forbes, Toronto Star, Minneapolis Star-Tribune, Providence Journal, Washington Times, and the Detroit Free Press.