Russia has stated that it is preparing to carry out “limited” annexation referendums in the coming months throughout various territories that have been taken from Ukraine throughout the war.
State-controlled media outlets have officially confirmed that the Russian-occupied area from the Donbas region in the east to the southern oblasts of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, to the outskirts of Kharkiv in the Northeast, is slated to carry out elections on potential annexation into the Russian Federation. These votes will likely be quite close to what took place in the 2014 referendum in Crimea, where handing control back to Kyiv was just not an option given on the ballot.
“The referendum will, of course, be held on our territory,” explained Mayor Alexander Saulenko of Berlansk, which is a coastal city in Zaporizhzhia, explained to the Russian state-owned TASS. “We are preparing for this referendum, it is planned for September, but I can’t say the exact date yet.”
Russia is trying to solidify and codify its control over the hard-fought territory it managed to grab as part of its current full-scale invasion of Ukraine that has continued to falter and halt over the past few months. The referendum paints their de facto annexation of the Ukrainian territory with a facade of quasi-legality, although international observers were quick to condemn the overall legitimacy of any vote such as this being carried out.
“Since they obviously are having trouble achieving geographic gains inside Ukraine, they are trying to gain that through false political means,” explained John Kirby, the White House national security spokesman, just last week. “The Russian officials themselves know that what they’re doing will lack legitimacy, and it will not reflect the will of the people.”
“This is a part of Russia’s playbook to attack the sovereignty, identity, and history of Ukraine,” stated the deputy spokesperson for the State Department, Verdant Patel. “We want to be clear: Any claim by the Kremlin that the Ukrainian people somehow want to join Russia is a lie.”
The overall outcome of this coming vote is almost certain, and the process is only a facade creating formality.
One senior Russian legislator, Andrei Turchak, reportedly stated just last week, “These territories are Russian regions.”