After the annexation of the four Ukrainian regions of Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhia and Cherson by Russian President Vladimir Putin, the Russian parliament has now ratified the incorporation, which has been criticized as a breach of international law. On Monday, MPs voted unanimously for the regions to be included in the Russian Federation. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who was present as a guest, emphasized that the regions are now under the country’s special protection.
Striking: It was officially reported that 413 or 412 MPs voted for the annexation. However, only 408 deputies signed up to vote on Monday, according to the critical portal “meduza.io”. Officially, the Duma has 450 deputies.
On Friday, Kremlin chief Putin signed internationally unrecognized accession agreements with the occupiers deployed by Moscow. The Duma still had to approve it. Subsequent approval by the Federation Council is considered a formality.
The Duma then rushed through laws on the integration of the four regions in Ukraine. “The laws fully strengthen the main social and economic guarantees of people living in the territories and create a system of protection of rights and freedom of citizens,” said the head of the Duma legal committee Pavel Krashennikov on Monday, according to the Interfax news agency. The laws are intended to regulate questions of property, citizenship and the new organs of power in the Kherson, Donetsk, Luhansk and Zaporizhia regions.
Russian citizenship is to be granted to all residents of the territories who apply for a passport and take an oath to the country’s constitution. This goes hand in hand with the promise of a pension payment and health care. The ruble will be introduced as the currency, but until the end of the year residents will also be able to pay in parallel with Ukrainian hryvnia. The new administrative bodies in the regions are to be created by June 1, 2023.
Putin’s “bloodhound”, Ramzan Kadyrov, called for a nuclear strike by Russia in the four annexed territories. Military experts are now explaining why that doesn’t make sense. With his aggressive verbal attacks, Kadyrov is also tearing a deep rift in Russia’s military structures.
Azovstal fighter Mikhailo Dianov spent four months in Russian captivity. He was recently released in a prisoner exchange. Now he speaks for the first time about the experiences. He tells of torture, humiliation and pain that will probably remain.
For Zelenskyj, the military successes make the annexations forgotten. Ex-CIA boss Petraeus sees a “desperate” Putin. And an analysis by the renowned ISW shows: Russian reporting is changing “fundamentally”. what happened in the night
