After phoney referendums that Kyiv and the West have dubbed a fraud, the first partial results of ballots cast within Russia on whether four Russian-occupied regions of Ukraine should be absorbed into Russia showed overwhelming majorities in favour.
The four regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson, which make up around 15% of Ukrainian land, held hastily organised ballots over the course of five days. Voting was open to persons who had been uprooted from specific areas in Russia.
According to RIA, early results from polling places on Russian soil indicated resounding majorities in favour of joining Russia. Based on 14% of the votes counted, they varied from 96.97% for the Kherson area to 98.19% for Zaporizhzhia.
With 14% and 13% of the votes counted, respectively, the majorities for the so-called Donetsk and Luhansk people’s republics were slightly under 98%.
In order to construct a legal justification for Russia to annex the four regions, Russian-installed officials moved voting boxes from house to house within the occupied regions, according to Ukraine and the West.
Any attempt by the Ukrainians to reclaim them would therefore be seen as an attack on Russia, according to President Vladimir Putin. Last week, he declared that he was prepared to use nuclear weapons to protect Russia’s “territorial integrity.”
Dmytro Kuleba, the foreign minister of Ukraine, encouraged the European Union to punish Russia with more economic penalties for holding the elections, which he claimed would not alter Ukraine’s position.
Seven months after Russia began its invasion of its neighbour, Kyiv has repeatedly warned that the absorption of more territory by Russia would end any hope of peace negotiations. It states that treason charges will be brought against Ukrainians who assisted Russia in organising the voting.
The results resembled a referendum held in Crimea in 2014, following Russia’s annexation of the area from Ukraine, in which the region’s authorities claimed that 97% of voters wanted to leave Ukraine and join Russia.
Putin claimed on state television on Tuesday that the ballots were intended to shield people from what Kyiv has denied: the persecutory treatment of ethnic Russians and Russian-speakers by Ukraine.
Recently, Moscow has taken steps to “Russify” the regions that it controls, including providing Russian passports to individuals and revising the curricula for schools.
After Ukraine gained the upper hand on the battlefield by defeating Russian soldiers in the northern Kharkiv region this month, the referendums were hastily moved forward.
The upper house of the Russian parliament, which is led by Valentina Matviyenko, stated that if the results of the referendum were favourable, it may consider incorporating the four regions on October 4, three days before Putin celebrates his 70th birthday.
Featured Image: Flickr.com
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