[LINK] "Ukraine May Leave Crimea’s Fate to Next Generation, Premier Says"

[rfmcdonald]

Bloomberg's lodymyr Verbyany and Kateryna Choursina report that the Ukrainian prime minister has said that, given Ukraine's position, it will have to wait to get Crimea back. I agree, this is sensible advice, but I also wonder if this will be settled. Shades of Alsace-Moselle?

Ukraine may have to leave the fate of Crimea to future generations, Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk said, a day after the president said the country can’t afford to take back its rebel-held areas by force.

The government in Kiev and its allies have condemned the March annexation of the Black Sea peninsula by Russian President Vladimir Putin’s government. The U.S. and the European Union have imposed economic sanctions on Russian companies, individuals and industries that have compounded an almost 50 percent drop in oil prices to tip Russia’s economy toward recession.

“There’s no quick and simple answer to how to bring Crimea back to Ukraine,” Yatsenyuk said today at a year-end news conference in Kiev. “Crimea was, is, and always will be Ukrainian territory. If God helps us while we are alive, we will be able to reinstate control over Crimea. If not, our children or grandchildren will do this.”

Ukrainian officials are focusing on diplomacy to secure an enduring truce in what has grown into the worst dispute between Russia and its Cold War foes since the fall of the Iron Curtain. The government has paused a military offensive started in April aimed at driving the pro-Russian separatists from the eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions, where fighting has killed more than 4,700 people, according to UN estimates.