Quote (Black XistenZ @ Jan 28 2021 12:15pm)
The western parts of Ukraine have historically been part of Europe, just like its eastern parts are historically tied to Russia. You can even see this split in the country's politics. For example, look at the results of the presidential runoff election in 2004 between the pro-EU (yellow) and the pro-Russia (blue) canddiate:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/71/Ukraine_Wahlen_2004_2.pngWhat I meant and important in this context is that Crimea has been part of Russia historically, until it was given to Ukraine by Russia in 1954.
Quote from Wikipedia article
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1954_transfer_of_CrimeaQuote
The transfer of the Crimean Oblast to Ukraine has been described as a "symbolic gesture", marking the 300th anniversary of Ukraine becoming a part of the Tsardom of Russia.[5][11][12] That "symbolic gesture" came out as a post factum and was never discussed as one of the reasons prior to the transfer. It was also attributed to Nikita Khrushchev, although the person who signed the document was Kliment Voroshilov.
Obviously Russia never intended to give Crimea away to Europe ^^