Russian Civilizations 5

Like Stalin said : It's not the people who vote that count. It's the people who count the votes.

Russia would never lie. They only came to protect the population. The integration of crimea has nothing to do with it.

On a serious note thought, even if yes of course in this case 97% is as stupid as the rest of the story, do remember that not every country has a democratic tradition and there are indeed countries where a 97% vote for anything would be realistic simply from a tradition of unity and harmony over a tradition of variety and opposition. Althought such countries are not likely to care about voting. ( vietnam some time back comes to mind ).

My thesis adviser is one of the world experts in election forensics, specializing in Ukraine and Russia. I can most definitely tell you that the vote isn't legitimate. But we all know that.

The legitimacy or not of the new ukrainian government doesn't in any way give legitimacy to this referendum.

Legitimate government or not, that doesnt give Russia the right to annex Crimea.
Im truly fed up with Russia and their foreign policy. Bunch of warmongers thats all they are lately.

(and dont give me any replies about how bad other countries are.. So others might be wrong too, but that doesnt make Russia's aggressiveness acceptable.. and in this case its about Russia..)