After the Russian withdrawal, Putin officially annexed 15% of Ukraine

LONDON (Reuters) – President Vladimir Putin completed the formal annexation of more than 15 percent of Ukraine on Wednesday, as Russian forces struggle to stem Ukrainian counter-attacks across swathes of the region.

In the largest territorial expansion of Russia in at least half a century, Putin signed laws allowing the entry into Russia of the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR), Kherson region, and Zaporizhia Region.

“President Vladimir Putin signed four federal constitutional laws on the entry into the Russian Federation of the Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhya and Kherson regions,” the lower house said.

“He also signed laws related to ratification,” the State Duma said.

Russia announced the annexations after holding what it called referendums in the occupied areas of Ukraine. Western governments and Kiev said the vote violated international law and was coercive and unrepresentative.

Not all of the areas being annexed are under the control of Russian forces fighting Ukrainian forces.

After more than seven months of war that has killed tens of thousands and caused the biggest confrontation with the West since the 1962 Cuban missile crisis, Russia’s primary goals have yet to be achieved.

In recent days, Russian forces have withdrawn from areas in eastern and southern Ukraine where they have come under heavy pressure from a Ukrainian counter-offensive that has drawn criticism from Putin’s top allies of the war machine.

Besides Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014, Putin’s total claim is more than 22% of Ukrainian territory, although the exact boundaries of the four regions he annexed have yet to be definitively clarified.

Russia, which recognized the borders of post-Soviet Ukraine in the 1994 Budapest Memorandum, will never return these areas, Putin said Friday at a grand Kremlin signing ceremony for a treaty that brought the partially controlled areas to Russia.

The Russian parliament said that people living in the annexed regions would be given Russian passports, the Russian Central Bank would oversee financial stability and the Russian ruble would be the official currency.

In justifying the February 24 invasion, Putin said Russian speakers in Ukraine had been persecuted by Ukraine which he said the West was trying to use to undermine Russian security.

Ukraine and its Western backers say Putin has no justification for what they say is an imperial-style land grab. Kyiv denies persecution of Russian speakers.

Now Putin is portraying the war as a battle for Russia’s survival against the United States and its allies, who he says want to destroy Russia and seize its vast natural resources.

Reporting by Reuters. Editing by Guy Faulconbridge

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