SIMFEROPOL (Sputnik) — On Thursday, a delegation of Italian lawmakers and businessmen, representing the northern Italian regions of Veneto, Liguria, Lombardy, Toscana and Emilia-Romagna, arrived in Crimea to take part in a number of events dedicated to the Russian-Italian and the Crimean-Italian relations, common cultural heritage and economic projects.
"The people of Crimea have used not the language of violence but the language of peace and they used Russian as a language to express themselves and to legitimize their right for self-determination. We came to Crimea to reaffirm that we are against the sanctions that are groundless. We are here to build bridges between Italy and the Russian Crimea and to boost our economic ties," Roberto Ciambetti said at a meeting with Chairman of the Republic of Crimea's State Council Vladimir Konstantinov.
The Crimean peninsula seceded from Ukraine and reunified with Russia after more than 96 percent of local voters supported the move in a referendum in March 2014. Kiev, as well as the European Union, the United States and their allies, did not recognize the move and consider the peninsula to be occupied territory.
Nevertheless, over 60 delegations from dozens of countries have visited Russia’s southwestern Crimea region this year, defying Western restrictions, including those from France, Italy, Jordan and many other nations.
