Russia and Ukraine flashpoint

[SecondWar]

Ryuu96 said:

Le Pen laughs at being banned from Ukraine, shrugs off Russia’s Crimea annexation, repeating her line “there was a referendum, Crimea was Ukrainian 26 years, the rest of the time it was Russian”

Reminder: the ref was held *after* Russia’s annexation, & declared invalid at the UN https://t.co/UVTK1Iw5mK

— Catherine Nicholson (@ACatInParis) April 14, 2022

It's points like this that are what make the specifics around this bit less black and white. Crimea is generally pro-Russian but the referendum looks really suspects given Russia seized the territory then ran the referendum. You can't really buy that it was run fairly with the possibility that an option to remain part of Ukraine would have been allowed to win. Such referendums can be lopsided in the result (see South Sudan independence referendum or Falklands referendum).