Timeline of the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation tug stormed the already damaged corvette "Ternopil" at Sevastopol and captured her using stun grenades and automatic fire. After the Federation Council approved on final reading the treaty of accession of the Crimea to the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin ratifies the inclusion of two new areas into the Russian Federation: the Republic of Crimea and the City of Federal Importance of Sevastopol. The Crimean Federal District is created with Oleg Belaventsev being appointed as its Presidential Envoy. At the same time Ukraine withdraws military troops from certain previously guarded areas in the Crimea and boycotts the right to travel to
Crimea by "the commonality of the economy, the proximity, and close economic and cultural relations between the Crimean region and the Ukrainian SSR". At that time no vote or referendum took place, and Crimean population had no say in the transfer (also typical of other Soviet border changes). After the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation, doubts have been expressed - from the Russian side by all means, but even by Western historians (Richard Sakwa, "Frontline Ukraine. Crisis In the Borderlands", 2015) - about the very legitimacy of the 1954 transition of Crimea to Ukraine; in the critics' view the