THE ‘RIGHT TO CHOOSE’ AGAINST THE EUROPEAN DOUBLE STANDARD

This paper reconstructs, from an argumentative standpoint, certain legal foundations of the international conflict concerning Crimea and the Donbas, as well as the responsibility borne by the European Union and Ukraine for its prolongation. On the basis of the documentary sources examined, it is argued that: (a) the Kyiv Agreement of 21 February 2014 was breached by the Ukrainian opposition, at the instigation of its purported European guarantors; (b) the Crimean referendum and the subsequent incorporation of the peninsula into the Russian Federation rest upon the right of peoples to self-determination and upon the safeguard clause of General Assembly Resolution 2625 (XXV); (c) Ukraine failed to comply with the Minsk Agreements and with Security Council Resolution 2202 (2015); (d) the European Union acts as a belligerent party and has adopted measures contrary both to its own constitutive treaties and to international law, applying its customary double standard in matters of sanctions, human rights and the protection of minorities; and (e) the BRICS+ model and legal pluralism offer an alternative framework that is more consistent with human dignity and the protection of minorities.