BartaBangla Desk :: Crimea’s parliament on Monday declared the region an independent state, after its residents voted overwhelmingly to break off from Ukraine and seek to join Russia.

In the same resolution, it said that all Ukrainian state property on the territory of the Black Sea peninsula will be nationalised and become the property of the Crimean Republic.

Sunday’s referendum is not recognised by the West, and the United States and the European Union are preparing sanctions against Russia, whose troops have been occupying Crimea for several weeks.

Crimean lawmakers have asked the United Nations and other nations to recognise it.

A delegation of Crimean lawmakers is set to travel to Moscow Monday for negotiations on how to proceed further. Russian lawmakers have suggested that formally annexing Crimea is just a matter of time.

Voters prefer Russia

Earlier, the final results of the referendum in Crimea show that 97 per cent of voters have supported leaving Ukraine to join Russia, the head of the referendum election commission said on Monday.

Ukraine’s new government in Kiev called the referendum a “circus” directed at gunpoint by Moscow.

The Crimean peninsula has been seized for two weeks now by troops under apparent Russian command.

Russia raised the stakes on Saturday when its forces, backed by helicopter gunships and armoured vehicles, took control of the Ukrainian village of Strilkove and a key natural gas distribution plant nearby — the first Russian military move into Ukraine beyond the Crimean peninsula of 2 million people.

The Russian forces later withdrew from the village but kept control of the gas plant. On Sunday, Ukrainian soldiers were digging trenches and erecting barricades between the village and the gas plant.

The Crimean parliament planned to meet on Monday to formally ask Moscow to be annexed, and Crimean lawmakers were to fly to Moscow later in the day for talks, Crimea’s Prime Minister said on Twitter.