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In an interview with The Associated Press and Russia's state NTV television, Ukraine's ousted president Yanukovych said Wednesday, "Crimea is a tragedy, a major tragedy."

In his first interview since fleeing to Russia, he vowed to try and persuade Russian President Vladimir Putin to return the Black Sea peninsula.

However, he insisted the referendum wouldn't have happened if he had stayed in power and that it was a response to threats posed by radical nationalists in Ukraine.

Yanukovych fled Ukraine in February after three months of escalating anti-government protests sparked by his decision to back out of an association treaty with the EU in favor of strengthening ties with Russia.

'I was wrong'

Yanukovych also said it was a mistake to have invited Russian troops into Crimea.

"I was wrong," he said. "I acted on my emotions."

Yanukovych said he has spoken with Putin several times since he arrived in Russia and said he hopes to have more meetings to negotiate Crimea's return to Ukraine.

"We must search for ways ... so that Crimea may have the maximum degree of independence possible ... but be part of Ukraine," he said.

Russian troops quickly seized Crimea, which has an ethnic Russian majority. Putin justified the move as protection for the mainly Russia-speaking population.

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Ukraine's ousted president, Yanukovych, calls Crimea annexation a 'tragedy'