Poll suggests 90% Muscovites back Crimea’s secession

MOSCOW, March 17 (Itar-Tass) - Almost 90 percent of polled Muscovites have backed Crimea’s joining Russia as a constituent entity, the president of the Public Opinion Foundation told a news conference on Monday referring to the opinion poll carried out jointly with the All-Russia Public Opinion Research Center (VTsIOM) between March 14 and 16. Alexander Oslon said “88.8 percent of surveyed citizens backed this against 8.1%” of those coming out against Crimean secession. He said an average figure of those objecting Crimea’s entry into Russia was higher in Moscow than across Russia on the whole, adding that “an average figure across Russia is 4.1 percent”. The director general of VTsIOM, Valery Fedorov, said for his part that he believed far from all Muscovites criticizing the Russian authorities were against Crimea’s entry into Russia. “According to opinion polls in Moscow and St. Petersburg, the number of those who disapprove of President Putin’s activity has declined over the past four weeks, and is 17 percent at the moment,” he said. “However, the number of those who do not back Crimea’s entry into Russia is about half as that,” Fedorov noted. He said those who did not support Crimea’s entry during the survey motivated their position by “a fear of war, fear of sanctions and expenditures”. He did not specify, however, the percentage of those expressing fears. Ninety-one percent of polled Russian nationals backed Crimea’s entry into Russia as its constituent member, the president of the Public Opinion Foundation said. According to the opinion poll carried out in all Russian regions, 94 percent believed Russia should protect the rights of ethnic Russians and other nationalities living in Crimea. Sociologists said 83 percent believed Russia should protect their rights “even if it worsens relations with other countries,” and 86 percent of the polled Russians said “Crimea is Russia”. Public Opinion Foundation and VTsIOM spoke by telephone to 48,590 people in all Russian regions. Between 300 and 1,000-odd people were surveyed in each of them. It was for the first time that an opinion poll was carried out jointly by two research centres, Oslon said.