SELIGER, August 27, /ITAR-TASS/. Last spring’s referendum in Crimea is beyond all doubt, because its results reflect the opinion of a majority of the population, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said at the national youth forum Seliger-2014.
“In Crimea, there was a unique situation, first and foremost because the referendum could not evoke any questions at all,” Lavrov said. “The population there took part in the voting and the expression of will was free, without any outside influences.”
“There have been no doubts at all about whether the result reflected the will of an overwhelming majority of the population,” he said.
Asked why Russia was the sole country that responded with respect to the results of referendums in Donetsk and Lugansk, Lavrov said that “any referendums on that score must be considered from the standpoint of the conditions that caused them.”
He added that the voting in the Ukrainian presidential election had taken place only in several parts of the country; the referendums, too, were held only in some parts of the south-eastern regions.