US, allies have decided to oust Russia from G8 over Crimea

The Autonomous Republic of Crimea declared independence from Ukraine on March 17 and formally applied to become part of Russia following a referendum a day earlier, in which nearly ۹۷ percent of the participants voted in favor of the move.

On March 21, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed into law the documents officially making Crimea part of the Russian territory. Putin said the move was carried out based on the international law.

“International law prohibits the acquisition of part or all of another state’s territory through coercion or force,” the White House said in a statement on Monday. “To do so violates the principles upon which the international system is built. We condemn the illegal referendum held in Crimea in violation of Ukraine’s constitution.”

“We also strongly condemn Russia’s illegal attempt to annex Crimea in contravention of international law and specific international obligations,” the statement added.

Earlier in the day, Russia brushed off the Western threat to expel it from the G8.

“G۸ is an informal organization that does not give out any membership cards and, by its definition, cannot remove anyone,” Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said during a news conference.

“If our Western partners believe that this organizational format has outlived, so be it. At least, we are not attached to this format and we don’t see a great misfortune if it will not gather. Maybe, for a year or two, it will be an experiment for us to see how we live without it,” Lavrov stated.

Meanwhile, the Group of Seven (G7) is threatening to step up its measures against Russia over the Ukraine crisis.

In a statement issued after crisis talks in The Hague on Monday, the G7 members said they are ready to intensify coordinated sanctions against Moscow. They also called on Russia to immediately de-escalate the situation.

The G7 has snubbed a planned meeting that Putin was due to host in the Black Sea resort city of Sochi in June, saying the group will hold a meeting in Brussels without Russia instead of the wider G8 summit.

In 1998, the group of industrialized nations known as the G7 — the US, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Japan, and Italy — added Russia to its fold, transforming it from the G7 to the G8.

On Monday, the US president’s Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes told reporters in The Hague there is no point in including Russia in the G8.

“Our view is simply that if Russia is flagrantly violating international law and the order that the G۷ has hoped to build since the end of the Cold War, there’s no need to engage with Russia,” Rhodes said.

“What Russia has done has been a violation of that entire international order built up over many decades,” he added.

Recently, US Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland disclosed that Washington has “invested” about $5 billion in “promoting democracy” in Ukraine over the past two decades.

In early February, Nuland visited Ukraine and held meetings with anti-Kremlin politicians who organized anti-government protests that led to the ouster of Viktor Yanukovych, the country’s democratically-elected president.