Russia this Friday, at a ceremony at the Kremlin, in Moscow, formalizes the annexation of the four Ukrainian regions that have recently hosted so-called “referendums”, which have been classified as “illegal” by several Western countries.
“The results are known, people have made their choice clear,” Russian President Vladimir Putin said of the so-called referendums in the Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson and Zaporijia regions. “Today we signed the agreement on the accession of these republics to the Russian Federation,” he said.
Putin says he is “confident that parliament” will support these four new regions, “because” it is the will of millions of people.’ ‘It is an unshakable right. It is in the first point of the UN letter,” he said, referring to the “principle of equality and self-determination of peoples.”
“Our ancestors also defended these regions,” recalled the Russian head of state, calling the soldiers of the special military operation “heroes”.
Putin stressed: “The people who live” in the four regions, Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson and Zaporijia, “are forever our citizens”. For the Russian president, “people wanted to return to their true homeland.”
He went on to say that the conflict and war, “which began in 2014”, referring to the Ukrainians, “and return to talks” must be ended. “We are ready for talks, but we are not going to talk about the fate of these four regions in these talks. It’s Russia”he said.
“We will defend our territory with all the means at our disposal,” Putin reiterated. “This is the great mission to liberate our people. We are going to rebuild the schools, the cities that were destroyed (…) and of course we are going to increase security in these regions,” he said.
He then referred to the end of the Soviet Union in 1991. According to Putin, the West believed that Russia would never be reborn. He spoke of the “terrible years” of the 1990s and said that Russia had strengthened itself.
He claimed that the Russian people will never live according to the will of others and accused the West of wanting to maintain a neo-colonial system to plunder the world.
“The West is looking for new opportunities to catch up with us. It has always dreamed of dividing our state into smaller states that will fight each other,” he said.
Russia’s Political Elite Looks All Pumped Up For Putin’s Big Speech pic.twitter.com/loHvOsFtDb
— max seddon (@maxseddon) September 30, 2022
“They are against new currencies, against new technologies of independent countries,” the president of Russia accuses. He even accuses some states of being vassals of the US, leaving “just a ruin” in their wake. “For them it is important to receive their profits”.
He believed that the Russian people will continue to defend the values and the motherland.
Putin said the US had set the precedent for the use of nuclear weapons, referring to the dropping of the atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan.
“The countries of the West say they give freedom and democracy to other peoples. It’s the exact opposite,” he defended.
“The Anglo-Saxons organized explosions in the gas pipelines. They started destroying European infrastructure,” the Russian president also accused the Russian president of the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines.
“A blitzkrieg against Russia has started,” he said. “Most states refuse this and want various forms of cooperation with Russia. Western states did not expect this. They want to achieve their goals through blackmail and bribes. They are in the past and want to be exclusive,” he condemned.
spoke in a “aggressive propaganda” by the West whom he accuses of spreading false information.
He continued to criticize Western countries over the sanctions imposed on Russia since the beginning of the war. And mocked: “In Europe, you have to convince European citizens to wear warmer clothes at home.”
He also stated that the collapse of Western hegemony is “irreversible”. “The world will never be the same again” Putin assured that he was attacking “satanic” Western values that run counter to “traditional” and “religious” values.
At the end of his speech, the Russian president said: “The truth is with us”.
The decrees for the accession of new territories to the Russian Federation were subsequently signed by Putin and the separatist leaders of the self-declared People’s Republics of Donetsk and Lugansk, as well as those of the Kherson and Zaporijia regions.
People chanted “Russia, Russia, Russia” after Putin signed the documents to annex the controlled/occupied territories in/of Ukraine. pic.twitter.com/DwBMGcrRpq
— IgorGeoPol (@IgorGeoPol) September 30, 2022
Official annexation was already expected after public consultations – which ended Tuesday – in the areas partly or wholly controlled by Russia in Ukraine, whose residents, Moscow claims, overwhelmingly supported the formal annexation of these areas by Russia.
The governments installed by Moscow in the four regions of southern and eastern Ukraine – a country that has been the target of a Russian military offensive since February – claim that the indicators of the “yes” vote to annexation have fluctuated between 87% and 99%.
Kiev, the United States and their Western allies strongly condemned the referenda, which they called a “farce”, saying they would not recognize the annexation of the territories.
On Thursday, United Nations (UN) Secretary General António Guterres warned Russia that the annexation of Ukrainian territories “will have no legal value and should be condemned”, stressing that “it cannot be reconciled with the international legal framework” .
“The Kremlin has announced that a ceremony will take place “next Friday” in Moscow that will initiate a process of annexation of the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson and Zaporijia. At this moment of danger, I must emphasize my duty as secretary -General of the defense of the United Nations Charter,” he said.
“The UN charter is clear. Any annexation of the territory of one state by another state as a result of the threat or use of force is a violation of the principles of the UN Charter and of international law,” the UN leader stressed..
Guterres also drew attention to the fact that Russia, as one of the five permanent members of the Security Council, has a special responsibility to respect the principles of the United Nations Charter.
“Any decision to proceed with the annexation of the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Lugansk, Kherson and Zaporijia will have no legal force and must be condemned. It cannot be reconciled with the international legal framework. It opposes everything that the international community should defend,” pleaded for the former Portuguese prime minister.
Source: DN
