Russia’s rubber stamp lower house of parliament, the State Duma, unanimously approved President Vladimir Putin’s bill and constitutional changes on Monday, formalizing the illegal seizure of four regions of Ukraine, with the vote in no doubt.
Russia’s rubber-stamp lower house of parliament, the State Duma, unanimously approved President Vladimir Putin’s bills on Monday, formalizing the illegal seizure of four regions of Ukraine, with the vote in no doubt.The upper house, Russia’s Federation Council, is expected to formalize the annexation, a violation of international law, on Tuesday. The moves signal to Ukraine and its supporters that Moscow sees the seizures as irreversible.
Underscoring the legal absurdity of Putin’s move, the Kremlin remained vague Monday about the areas it is annexing. It is clear that its claims extend beyond the areas under Russian control — a reality evidenced by the Ukrainian military’s success in pushing Russian forces from the strategic city of Lyman in the Donetsk region.
In two other regions, Donetsk and Luhansk, the borders will be those declared by the two regions in 2014, when they proclaimed themselves independent from Ukraine after Moscow orchestrated separatist uprisings there, claiming swaths of territory they did not hold. Ambiguities persist, since neither the Russian military nor the Kremlin’s political proxies fully control either of those regions.
Instead, key Kremlin propagandists are sullen and belligerent, the elite are worried, and polls show that the population is fearful, with support for continuing the war declining sharply after Putin announced a military mobilization drive last month.In 2014, only one member of the Duma, Ilya Ponomarev, voted against the annexation of Crimea. He left Russia soon afterward and now lives in Ukraine.
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