The Russian president, Vladimir Putin, has backed the referendums, which come after nearly seven months of fighting and a significant military setback for Moscow in northeastern Ukraine this month.
On Friday, a referendum on joining Russia will be held in four regions of Ukraine that are under Russian and pre-Moscow control. After Russian-installed leaders in the provinces of Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia announced plans for the votes, which are anticipated to be held from Friday to Tuesday, it announced its intention to annex roughly 15% of Ukrainian territory through referendums.
The referendums, which have the support of Russian President Vladimir Putin, come after nearly seven months of fighting and a significant military loss for Moscow this month in northeastern Ukraine.
The West has criticized the action as a flagrant violation of international law that could escalate the ongoing conflict, but it has countered that it is a platform for regional citizens to voice their opinions.
According to Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, “From the beginning of the operation… we stated that the peoples of the respective territories should decide their fate, and the current situation confirms that they want to be masters of their fate.”
In a move compared to its annexation of Crimea in 2014, Ukraine claimed that Russia intended to use the referendum results as a pretext for annexation before misrepresenting them as a sign of popular support.
As of right now, it is clear that neither Ukraine nor its allies will accept the results.
Following Russia’s invasion of the country and the beginning of a war that has left millions displaced and thousands dead, Ukraine launched a counteroffensive this month and successfully reclaimed large portions of its lost territory.
According to news source Reuters, Moscow could use the four territories as grounds for escalating military action in defense of its borders.
The Russian President allegedly alluded to nuclear weapons when he said that Moscow would “use all means at our disposal” to defend itself on Wednesday. This wasn’t a bluff, it was said.
Dmitry Medvedev, the former Russian president who led the country from 2008 to 2012, said in a post on Telegram on Tuesday that encroachment onto Russian territory is a crime that entitles you to use all force necessary for self-defense.
This is the reason Kyiv and the West fear these referendums so much.
9World leaders, including US President Joe Biden, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, and French President Emmanuel Macron, have all condemned the referendums.
The “sham referendums” are “illegal and illegitimate”, according to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, a 30-member intergovernmental military alliance.
The rigged Crimean referendum in 2014 had an official result of 97 percent in favor of formal annexation.
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