You're reading: Russian Prosecutor General’s Office says decision on making Crimea part of Soviet Ukraine in 1954 illegitimate

MOSCOW - The decision made by the presidiums of the Supreme Council of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR) and the Supreme Council of the Soviet Union (USSR) on transferring the Crimean region to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic (Ukrainian SSR) in 1954 was inconsistent with the Soviet constitution in effect at the moment, the Russian Prosecutor General's Office said.

‘The decisions adopted by the presidiums of the Supreme Councils of the RSFSR and the USSR in 1954 on transferring the Crimean region from the RSFSR to the Ukrainian SSR were against both the RSFSR constitution and the Soviet constitution,’ the Prosecutor General’s Office said in its reply to a formal inquiry by Sergei Mironov, the leader of the party A Just Russia.

The presidium of the RSFSR Supreme Council was not authorized to consider the passage of territories belonging to the RSFSR to other republics within the Soviet Union, as the Soviet constitution stipulated that the matter was within the jurisdiction of the top governance bodies, it said.

As for the city of Sevastopol, it remained under the RSFSR jurisdiction even though the Crimean region was made part of the Ukrainian SSR in 1954, it said.

Russian federal status of Sevastopol within its administrative borders as of December 1991 was subsequently reaffirmed by a Russian Supreme Council resolution.