J'ai sélectionné et commenté ci-après quelques extraits de la version officielle en anglais du discours de Poutine devant la Douma.
(vous pouvez en lire l'intégralité sur le site: http://eng.kremlin.ru/news/6889)
Ce discours m'a semblé intéressant autant par ce qu'il dit que par ce qu'il tait ou suggère implicitement.
Voici d'abord comment il définit la Crimée:
Crimea is a unique blend of different peoples’ cultures and traditions. This makes it similar to Russia as a whole, where not a single ethnic group has been lost over the centuries. Russians and Ukrainians, Crimean Tatars and people of other ethnic groups have lived side by side in Crimea, retaining their own identity, traditions, languages and faith.
Incidentally, the total population of the Crimean Peninsula today is 2.2 million people, of whom almost 1.5 million are Russians, 350,000 are Ukrainians who predominantly consider Russian their native language, and about 290,000-300,000 are Crimean Tatars, who, as the referendum has shown, also lean towards Russia.
commentaire: d'après les chiffres officiels le référendum a eu 82% de participation et 95% de "oui" soit un taux d'adhésion de l'ordre de 78%; les Tatars représentent d'après Poutine 13,5 % de la population globale. Si l'on suppose que les Ukrainiens non-russophones natifs et viscéralement hostiles à la Russie sont minoritaires en Crimée, on peut supposer que les 22% de rejet (car dans les conditions où s'est tenu le vote, l'abstention est une forme de résistance passive) regroupent au contraire l'essentiel de la minorité tatare... ainsi qu'une partie des ukrainiens criméens.
True, there was a time when Crimean Tatars were treated unfairly, just as a number of other peoples in the USSR. There is only one thing I can say here: millions of people of various ethnicities suffered during those repressions, and primarily Russians.
commentaire: à la place de Poutine j'aurais pris soin de rappeler au passage que Staline n'était pas Russe mais Géorgien...
Crimean Tatars returned to their homeland. I believe we should make all the necessary political and legislative decisions to finalise the rehabilitation of Crimean Tatars, restore them in their rights and clear their good name.
commentaire: en fait, seule une toute petite minorité des déportés a pu rentrer et les spoliations dont ils ont été victimes n'ont jamais été réparées ni par la Russie ni par l'Ukraine.
We have great respect for people of all the ethnic groups living in Crimea. This is their common home, their motherland, and it would be right – I know the local population supports this – for Crimea to have three equal national languages: Russian, Ukrainian and Tatar.
commentaire: cette suggestion est une proposition intéressante qui pourrait fournir la base d'une charte des minorités valable pour toute l'Ukraine.
After the revolution, the Bolsheviks, for a number of reasons – may God judge them – added large sections of the historical South of Russia to the Republic of Ukraine. This was done with no consideration for the ethnic make-up of the population, and today these areas form the southeast of Ukraine.
commentaire: l'appel au jugement de Dieu sur les Bolcheviks montre bien comment Poutine joue de plus en plus la carte du rétablissement psychologique et idéologique d'une continuité avec la Russie "blanche" d'avant 1917 en jouant en parallèle sur deux nostalgies: celle de la puissance soviétique, bien sûr, mais aussi celle d'une Russie pré-révolutionnaire idéalisée où l'autocratie, l'armée et l'église orthodoxe marchaient main dans la main, comme aujourd'hui sous le néo-tsar Vladimir Vladimirovitch (plus anecdotiquement, le célèbre personnage des romans policiers de B. Akounine, le détective Eraste Fandorine, joue également sur cette nostalgie-là; je me souviens aussi d'avoir dîné il y a dix ans dans un restaurant pétersbourgeois appelé "L'année 1913", ainsi nommé parce c'était la dernière belle année de la Russie avant la Grande Guerre et la Révolution) ; on peut remarquer d'autre part, que Poutine conteste désormais clairement la définition "bolchevique" des frontières de l'Ukraine.
Then, in 1954, a decision was made to transfer Crimean Region to Ukraine, along with Sevastopol, despite the fact that it was a federal city. This was the personal initiative of the Communist Party head Nikita Khrushchev. What stood behind this decision of his – a desire to win the support of the Ukrainian political establishment or to atone for the mass repressions of the 1930’s in Ukraine – is for historians to figure out.
commentaire: pour en savoir plus sur la "dékoulakisation" et la féroce politique de réquisitions agricoles menée en Ukraine par Molotov et Kaganovitch entre 1931 et 1934 lire par exemple: "1933, l'année noire" de Georges Sokoloff (Albin Michel); le nombre de victimes est estimé à 4 millions de morts par famine en quelques mois (plus tous les autres...)
What matters now is that this decision was made in clear violation of the constitutional norms that were in place even then. The decision was made behind the scenes. Naturally, in a totalitarian state nobody bothered to ask the citizens of Crimea and Sevastopol. They were faced with the fact. People, of course, wondered why all of a sudden Crimea became part of Ukraine. But on the whole – and we must state this clearly, we all know it – this decision was treated as a formality of sorts because the territory was transferred within the boundaries of a single state. Back then, it was impossible to imagine that Ukraine and Russia may split up and become two separate states. However, this has happened.
At the same time, we have to admit that by launching the sovereignty parade Russia itself aided in the collapse of the Soviet Union. And as this collapse was legalised, everyone forgot about Crimea and Sevastopol – the main base of the Black Sea Fleet. Millions of people went to bed in one country and awoke in different ones, overnight becoming ethnic minorities in former Union republics, while the Russian nation became one of the biggest, if not the biggest ethnic group in the world to be divided by borders.
Now, many years later, I heard residents of Crimea say that back in 1991 they were handed over like a sack of potatoes. This is hard to disagree with. And what about the Russian state? What about Russia? It humbly accepted the situation. This country was going through such hard times then that realistically it was incapable of protecting its interests. However, the people could not reconcile themselves to this outrageous historical injustice. All these years, citizens and many public figures came back to this issue, saying that Crimea is historically Russian land and Sevastopol is a Russian city. Yes, we all knew this in our hearts and minds, but we had to proceed from the existing reality and build our good-neighbourly relations with independent Ukraine on a new basis. Meanwhile, our relations with Ukraine, with the fraternal Ukrainian people have always been and will remain of foremost importance for us.
commentaire: Poutine joue longuement sur la thématique de l'identité russe de la Crimée
Time and time again attempts were made to deprive Russians of their historical memory, even of their language and to subject them to forced assimilation. Moreover, Russians, just as other citizens of Ukraine are suffering from the constant political and state crisis that has been rocking the country for over 20 years.
commentaire: Poutine met clairement dans le même sac tous les dirigeants ukrainiens qu'ils aient été précédemment catalogués pro- ou anti-russes
I understand why Ukrainian people wanted change. They have had enough of the authorities in power during the years of Ukraine’s independence. Presidents, prime ministers and parliamentarians changed, but their attitude to the country and its people remained the same. They milked the country, fought among themselves for power, assets and cash flows and did not care much about the ordinary people. They did not wonder why it was that millions of Ukrainian citizens saw no prospects at home and went to other countries to work as day labourers. I would like to stress this: it was not some Silicon Valley they fled to, but to become day labourers. Last year alone almost 3 million people found such jobs in Russia. According to some sources, in 2013 their earnings in Russia totalled over $20 billion, which is about 12% of Ukraine’s GDP.
commentaire: ces statistiques sur la dépendance de L'Ukraine vis-à-vis de la Russie montrent bien l'ampleur du problème auquel l'Ukraine devrait faire face en cas de rupture totale des relations économiques.
I would like to reiterate that I understand those who came out on Maidan with peaceful slogans against corruption, inefficient state management and poverty. The right to peaceful protest, democratic procedures and elections exist for the sole purpose of replacing the authorities that do not satisfy the people. However, those who stood behind the latest events in Ukraine had a different agenda: they were preparing yet another government takeover; they wanted to seize power and would stop short of nothing. They resorted to terror, murder and riots. Nationalists, neo-Nazis, Russophobes and anti-Semites executed this coup. They continue to set the tone in Ukraine to this day.
The new so-called authorities began by introducing a draft law to revise the language policy, which was a direct infringement on the rights of ethnic minorities. However, they were immediately ‘disciplined’ by the foreign sponsors of these so-called politicians. One has to admit that the mentors of these current authorities are smart and know well what such attempts to build a purely Ukrainian state may lead to. The draft law was set aside, but clearly reserved for the future. Hardly any mention is made of this attempt now, probably on the presumption that people have a short memory. Nevertheless, we can all clearly see the intentions of these ideological heirs of Bandera, Hitler’s accomplice during World War II.
commentaire: Poutine prend acte que les Occidentaux ont fait pression pour que la loi "anti-langue-russe" ne soit pas mise en vigueur mais maintient sa position de défiance systématique vis-à-vis des "sponsors" étrangers
It is also obvious that there is no legitimate executive authority in Ukraine now, nobody to talk to. Many government agencies have been taken over by the impostors, but they do not have any control in the country, while they themselves – and I would like to stress this – are often controlled by radicals. In some cases, you need a special permit from the militants on Maidan to meet with certain ministers of the current government. This is not a joke – this is reality.
commentaire: Poutine exagère probablement un peu: je suis sûr que les conseillers américains et européens de Yatseniouk ont le droit d'entrer partout...
Those who opposed the coup were immediately threatened with repression. Naturally, the first in line here was Crimea, the Russian-speaking Crimea. In view of this, the residents of Crimea and Sevastopol turned to Russia for help in defending their rights and lives, in preventing the events that were unfolding and are still underway in Kiev, Donetsk, Kharkov and other Ukrainian cities.
commentaire: "stil underway" indique bien que Poutine envisage comme possible des interventions russes ailleurs en Ukraine (y compris nommément à Kiev) et pas seulement en Crimée.