on the other hand when the right to self-determination runs counter to the west's geopolitical interests as it did in the case of the people of crimea's expression of free will at the 2014 referendum on the peninsula's reunification with russia it forgets all about it and in and introduces illegitimate sanctions for the exercise of this right the reason is simple the crimeans were saving themselves from the ultra-radicalswho were behind the coup in ukraine supported by the west which means that since the good guys came to power in kiev they are accorded by western rules to be protected and escalated