Barack Obama has sparked a row with the Ukrainian government by suggesting that local “sympathy” for Russia blocked a tougher Western response to Moscow’s seizure of Crimea in 2014.
The former US president said that a stronger national identity had only developed in Ukraine after 2014 and that many previously welcomed Russian intervention.
“There’s a reason there was not an armed invasion of Crimea because Crimea was full of a lot of Russian speakers and there was some sympathy to the views that Russia was representing,” said Mr Obama, who was president during the crisis.
Kyiv contends that Russian troops, known as “little green men” as they operated without badges, were crucial in capturing the peninsula. Masked soldiers occupied and blockaded the main airport, military bases and parliament in Simferopol, the second largest city in Crimea.
The Ukrainian government responded to the annexation of Crimea and Russian meddling in the eastern Donbas region by seeking to cut cultural and linguistic ties.
Hard sell to impose sanctions
Mr Obama said that he had done everything he could in 2014 to lead a tough international response by forcing European countries “kicking and screaming” to impose sanctions which he said stopped Vladimir Putin “from continuing through the Donbas and through the rest of Ukraine”.
He also defended Angela Merkel, the former chancellor of Germany, against rising accusations she failed to spot the threat from Putin’s regime, saying he “gives enormous credit” to her role in organising Western sanctions.
Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky, criticised Mr Obama for not admitting that Western weakness had emboldened Putin.
“We should not be surprised that today there is a full-scale Russian aggression in Europe,” he said.
“The current Russian authoritarian regime is a blatant reflection of a specific pre-war Western policy.
“Maybe it’s time to start admitting critical mistakes instead of coming up with new excuses?”
In the interview with CNN’s Christine Amanpour, Mr Obama also praised Ukraine’s fightback against Russia.
“Watching the Ukrainians themselves, with such courage and bravery, fight back, I think that reminded Europe of who they were,” he said.