[elefanten]

This is a thoughtful comment that shouldn't be grayed (as it is at the time of my reading).

But it doesn't answer gp. Whatever an enlightened political philosophy debate might yield, Russia annexed Crimea by force at a time when it was not theirs. Full stop.

However good Russia's case was or however much a majority of the inhabitants wanted control to change, control was ultimately changed via unjustified means that should be rejected by the international community.

The proof of Russia's lack of genuine interest in the will of those people is how quickly it came in to start shooting. You don't resolve national break-ups in weeks or months (see, for example, the dissolution of Czechoslovakia).