Putin mobilises to keep seized areas

PUSHBACK: ANNEXATION REFERENDUMS ANNOUNCED

Kyiv’s forces retake hundreds of towns and villages.

President Vladimir Putin ordered a partial military mobilisation and vowed yesterday to use “all available means” to protect Russian territory, after Moscow-held regions of Ukraine suddenly announced annexation referendums.

The votes, already denounced by Kyiv and the West as a “sham”, will dramatically up the stakes in the seven-month old conflict in Ukraine by giving Moscow the ability to accuse Ukrainian forces of attacking its own territory.

Four Russian-occupied regions of Ukraine – Donetsk and Lugansk in the east and Kherson and Zaporizhzhia in the south – said on Tuesday that they would hold the votes over five days beginning tomorrow.

In a prerecorded address to the nation early yesterday, Putin accused the West of trying to “destroy” his country through its backing of Kyiv, and said Russia needed to support those in Ukraine who wanted to “determine their own future”.

The Russian leader announced a partial military mobilisation, with Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu telling state television that some 300 000 reservists would be called up.

“When the territorial integrity of our country is threatened, we will certainly use all the means at our disposal to protect Russia and our people. This is not a bluff,” Putin said. “Those who are trying to blackmail us with nuclear weapons should know that the wind can also turn in their direction.”

Putin said that through its support for Ukraine the West was trying to “weaken, divide and ultimately destroy our country”, while Shoigu said Moscow was “fighting not so much Ukraine as the collective West” in Ukraine.

The sudden flurry of moves by Moscow this week came with Russian forces in Ukraine facing their biggest challenge since the start of the conflict.

Shoigu said yesterday 5 937 Russian soldiers had died in Ukraine since February. A sweeping Ukrainian counter-offensive in recent weeks has seen Kyiv’s forces retake hundreds of towns and villages that had been controlled by Russia.

The referendums follow a pattern first established in 2014, when Russia annexed the Crimea peninsula from Ukraine after a similar vote.

Kyiv said the referendums were meaningless, saying its forces would keep retaking territory regardless of what Moscow or its proxies announced. –

Picture: AFP SHELLED. People walk past a destroyed building in Kupiansk, Kharkiv region, on Monday mid the Russian invasion of Ukraine. In the northeastern town of Kupiansk, which was recaptured by Ukrainian forces, clashes continued with the Russian army entrenched on the eastern side of the Oskil river.