Thursday, February 20, 2020

Kyiv Wants NATO Assistance to Conduct Satellite Census of Donbass and Crimea


Paul Goble
           
            Staunton, February 13 – Because it cannot send in its own census takers on the ground in Russian-occupied Crimea and the Donbass, the Ukrainian government wants to conduct an enumeration via satellite and is currently discussing this possibility with representatives of NATO (atr.ua/news/196160-kabmin-hocet-provesti-perepis-naselenia-na-donbasse-i-v-krymu-s-pomosu-sputnika).

Dmytro Dubilet, who is currently minister of the Ukrainian council of ministers, says that NATO has already conducted such a census in Afghanistan and could help Ukraine do something similar in Russian-occupied areas, although he conceded that at best this method will yield only approximate results.

One of the reasons such an enumeration even if it isn’t perfect is so important to Ukraine is that without Russian-occupied territories, Ukraine has a total population of only 37 million, a total Moscow has played up to suggest Ukraine is rapidly depopulating. But with them, its population is 44 million, a more impressive figure.  

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