Posted Sep 30, 2022 7:00 AMUpdated on Sep 30, 2022 at 7:13 am
The ceremony will start this Friday at 2 p.m., Paris time. Long speech and festivities in Moscow: the Russian president has planned to ratify with great fanfare the annexation by Russia of four Ukrainian regions, threatening to use nuclear weapons in the face of invective from kyiv and its Western allies. The Russian capital has prepared for festivities, with traffic restricted today, including a concert in the shadow of the Kremlin walls at which Vladimir Putin could make an appearance.
Officials installed by Moscow in the regions of Donetsk and Lugansk, Zaporizhia and Kherson were already in the Russian capital on Thursday, according to local media. As a prelude to this formalization, Vladimir Putin signed several decrees recognizing the independence of the Ukrainian regions of Zaporijjia and Kherson. Russia recognized the independence of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) and the Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) in February, at the request of their pro-Russian separatist leaders, shortly before the start of its offensive in Ukraine launched on 24 february.
These four regions will be officially annexed by Russia, after “referendums” organized at the end of September on their attachment to Russia. Consultations carried out under the supervision of armed men, described as “parody” and “simulacra” by kyiv and its Western supporters. Russia already annexed Crimea, a peninsula in southern Ukraine, in 2014.
Voting at the UN
kyiv’s military successes in early September forced Vladimir Putin to hastily organize these annexation “referendums” and mobilize hundreds of thousands of Russians into the army, a move that drove crowds into an exodus from Russia. The UN Security Council must vote this Friday on a resolution condemning these “referendums”, indicated Thursday evening the French presidency of the Council. This text, prepared by the United States and Albania, has no chance of being adopted because of Russia’s right of veto, but it should then be presented to the UN General Assembly.
“I want to be very clear about this: the United States will never, ever, ever recognize Russia’s claims to the sovereign territory of Ukraine,” said US President Joe Biden, referring to an “absolute travesty of referendums”. For UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, such behavior has “no place in the modern world”.
Claiming its control over these territories, Moscow again threatened on Tuesday to use nuclear weapons. “Russia has the right to use nuclear weapons if necessary”, hammered the former president and number two of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev. A position confirmed by the Kremlin spokesman who recalled Russian military doctrine, which provides for the possibility of such strikes in the event of an attack against Russian territory.
$12 billion in aid
Vladimir Putin assured Thursday that a “more just world order” was being formed through “a difficult process”. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky called an emergency meeting of his Security Council on Friday and called for increased aid from his allies. A request to which the US Senate responded by voting on Thursday for a new envelope of more than 12 billion dollars, with a military component of some 3 billion to train, equip and pay Ukrainian troops.
Ukraine is indeed continuing its counter-offensive in the East and the South. After having reconquered most of the North-East, his troops seem to be working to retake Lyman, a town in the Donetsk region and an important railway hub that the Russian army has controlled since May. Ukrainian forces have also regained full control of the Kupyansk railway junction in the northeast, managing to drive Russian troops from the east bank of the city, AFP journalists noted on Thursday.
As discontent mounts in Russia in the face of an often chaotic mobilization, Vladimir Putin on Thursday acknowledged “errors to be corrected”, asking to “bring home those who have been summoned without appropriate reason”. On the international front of the conflict, it was leaks due to mysterious explosions on the Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines that fueled new Russian-Western tensions.
The two camps are now accusing each other half-heartedly of having sabotaged the underwater tubes, a crucial infrastructure for the European supply of Russian gas. Vladimir Putin thus denounced an “act of international terrorism” and “an unprecedented act of sabotage”. A meeting of the UN Security Council is scheduled for today on the subject, at the request of Moscow.
SourceAFP
