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Crimea Asks to Join Russia: Referendum to Be Held March 16

Crimea Asks to Join Russia: Referendum to Be Held March 16
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Authorities in Crimea on Thursday asked Russian President Vladimir Putin to examine a request for their region to join the Russian Federation, which will be put to a referendum on March 16.

Crimea Asks to Join Russia: Referendum to Be Held March 16"The parliament of Crimea has adopted a motion for Crimea to join Russia. It has asked the Russian president and parliament to consider this request," Grigoriy Ioffe, a senior lawmaker stated.

A closed-door session of parliament also set a referendum for March 16 that will ask residents whether they want their region to "become part of Russia as a subject of the federation", Ioffe said.

Ioffe said the second question on the referendum would be whether Crimea should return to the wide autonomy it enjoyed under a previous 1992 constitution, which gave it de facto independence.
Seventy-eight out of 86 lawmakers in the local parliament voted in favor of the motions.

Crimea is home to Russia's Black Sea fleet and had been part of Russia since the late 18th century, before Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev transferred it to Ukraine as a "gift" in 1954.
This comes as the US Secretary of State John Kerry will hold a second round of talks with his Russian counterpart Sergei Lavrov, as well as European Union foreign ministers later Thursday and the UN Security Council will hold talks in New York, the body's fourth consultations on the subject since Friday.

EU leaders were set to hold an emergency summit in Brussels later Thursday with Ukraine's interim Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk, who took over after former pro-Moscow President Viktor Yanukovych fled to Russia last month following three months of deadly protests.

The summit will be attended by Angela Merkel, Francois Hollande, David Cameron and other European Union leaders to discuss "the situation in Ukraine and the EU's reaction," according to the European Council.

Source: News Agencies, Edited by website team

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