Russia is preparing to formalize the annexation of the occupied territories of Zaporijjia, Kherson, Luhansk and Donetsk, after the results of the annexation referendums on Tuesday, September 28. Yet none of the affected Ukrainian oblasts is fully controlled by Russian forces. Clashes continue in the Kherson and Donetsk region, and a counter-offensive is underway in Luhansk. The yellow and blue flag has always flown in the eponymous capital of the Zaporizhia region.
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The front line is shifting, but according to franceinfo calculations, Russian forces would control around 14.8% of Ukrainian territory – or 85,000 square meters, the equivalent of the Nouvelle-Aquitaine region – and 18.6% by holding account of the annexed Crimea. By integrating the four oblasts into their current administrative boundaries, and not simply the areas under Russian control, Moscow would claim 18% of Ukraine – the equivalent of Bulgaria or Iceland – and 23.5% including the Crimea – the area of Greece.
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Will future treaties refer to all Ukrainian administrative oblasts, or to occupied areas? This alternative – which opposes an extensive version and at least – is not rhetorical, since it engages Russia’s future attitude and the contours of its nuclear deterrent. The problem is that the Kremlin has given few clues about the self-proclaimed future contours of its federation. And this, despite the urgent organization of pseudo-referendums, decisive for the future of the populations concerned.
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After the referendum in Crimea, Russia was content to transpose the federal borders onto the administrative borders of the Ukrainian province. The thing, obviously, is more complex in the Donbass. “There is no precise answer on this point and both options remain possible.writes Russian political scientist Ekaterina Schulmann to franceinfo. But in either case, the annexations will result in the continuation of the war, not its end.”
At this stage, it is therefore necessary to be content with simple oral statements, which are binding only on their authors. “The referendums concern all the territories within the administrative limits”commented (in Russian) Vladimir Rogov, head of the occupation authorities of the Zaporizhia region. Denis Pushilin, pro-Russian leader from Donetsk, went to Moscow to settle, he says, the “legal points” of future annexation. “The entire constitutional territory of the DPR will be liberated”he added.
“But what does that mean? And is there a geographical description in their Constitution?”, replies Ekaterina Schulmann. This provides both options. “The territory of the Donetsk People’s Republic is determined by the borders that existed on the day of its formation” in 2014, thus evokes the text.
On February 21, Vladimir Putin signed equally ambiguous decrees to recognize the independence of the self-proclaimed “republics” of Luhansk and Donetsk. Articles 7 of the respective treaties (here and there) simply mentioned respect for “territorial integrity and the inviolability of existing borders” of Russia and the two occupied territories. The text does not formally establish outlines.
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“These texts do not necessarily seem clear and the President of the Senate had first retained a version at least, analyzes geopolitical scientist David Teurtrie, contacted by franceinfo. But the Kremlin had rectified and set the goal of conquering the entirety of the two Donbass oblasts.” Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev said in February that the independence of these entities should be recognized within administrative borders. “Vladimir Putin has taken a stand on this, and going back on this goal would make him lose face.”
Witness the comments made on Wednesday by Dmitry Peskov, who said that “the special operation” Russian would continue until “all the territory of the DPR be liberated within the borders of the Donetsk region”. The situation, continues David Teurtrie, is on the other hand more confused for the two southern oblasts, with which no text has ever been signed. “The Russian army is doing its utmost to control the entire Kherson oblast”but “the front is extremely stable in that of Zaporijjia”.
“You have to distinguish between the self-proclaimed people’s republics of Donbass, where the Kremlin will want to control the existing borders, and the others, where there is arguably more room for manoeuvre.”
David Teurtrie, associate researcher at the Europes-Eurasia Research Centerat franceinfo
The annexation of the administrative oblasts would still place “the Kremlin in a strange position”points out the Institute for the Study of War (in English), because he would then have to demand the withdrawal of Ukrainian troops, however legitimate, accusing them of being on Russian territory. Vladimir Putin could “being in a humiliating position, unable to enforce this request”. This extensive option could bring Ukrainian territories under the Russian deterrence doctrine. This provides for the use of nuclear weapons in the event of“aggression with conventional weapons threatening the existence of the state”.
The issue of borders should probably be settled in the accession treaties of the four territories concerned. Anton Getta, deputy chairman of the committee for the financial market in the Duma, has already said (in English) that there would be no border or customs between these territories and Russia. Simple checkpoints, at most.
In addition, a new federal district could soon bring together the four occupied regions and that of Crimea, believes the Russian economic daily Vedomosti (in Russian). Still according to this source, this mission could be entrusted to the former director general of the Roscosmos space agency, Dmitry Rogozine. Sergei Axionovleader of the Russian occupation in Crimea, has already issued a warning, in the wake of the referendums: Russia “will go from a special operation to liberate the territories to an anti-terrorist operation within the borders of his country”.