When can a region declare independence from a country?

[Professor]

[The Dharma Bum]

Are you aware of the Russian/US alliance that saved the union during the Civil War?

[The Dharma Bum]

I'm not trying to change the subject, this is related to what is occurring in Ukraine today.

[Spider]

Legally declare? Only if it doesn't violate any laws. Cut and dried.

Morally declare? That gets complicated fast.

Actually pull it off? Thats a matter of guns and money.

[gla22]

[gla22]

[Spider]

Depends also on how much their secession hurts everyone else, though. The loss of Crimea is bad news for Ukrainians in several big ways. Does the minority in Crimea getting what they want justify doing damage to the majority in Ukraine? In any case, Crimea isn't seeking self rule, though as an autonomous polity already they've got more of it than anyone else in Crimea...they are simply trying to move under Russia's thumb. All this independence stuff is utter BS and everyone knows it.

[Philly]

[Philly]

Anyway, to answer the question, anyone can declare whatever they want but secession is one of those things you can't do unilaterally unless you can win the ensuing war. When you declare sovereignty on a piece of land that another sovereign state has already laid claim to of course there's gonna be fighting.

[Professor]

I guess it would differ by state and nation. But, here in the US, any right or power not specifically granted to the Fed is reserved for the state. I don't see anywhere where the Fed has the power to forbid a state from seceding. And, the land within a state is the property of that state, or its citizens. Some land is Federal, but that land would remain Federal (ala Gitmo).

If the Ukraine is a democratic country, and Crimea has it's own parliament (which it seems to have), and that Parliament elects to secede, what right does Ukraine have to prevent it?