Annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation Yanukovych. At the end of the meeting Putin remarked that "we must start working on returning Crimea to Russia". On 23 February, pro-Russian demonstrations were held in the Crimean city of Sevastopol. On 27 February masked Russian troops without insignia took over the Supreme Council (parliament) of Crimea, and captured strategic sites across Crimea, which led to the installation of the pro-Russian Aksyonov government in Crimea, the conducting of the Crimean status referendum and the declaration of Crimea's independence on 16 March 2014. Russia formally incorporated Crimea as two federal subjects of the Russian Federation with effect from 18 March
Annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation the same results. Crimea was fully integrated into the Russian media sphere, and links with the rest of Ukraine were hardly existent. On 26 November 2018, lawmakers in the Ukraine Parliament overwhelmingly backed the imposition of martial law along Ukraine's coastal regions and those bordering Russia in response to the firing upon and seizure of Ukrainian naval ships by Russia near the Crimean peninsula a day earlier. A total of 276 lawmakers in Kiev backed the measure, which takes effect on 28 November 2018 and will automatically expire in 30 days. The number of tourists visiting Crimea in the 2014