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"Point of no return" in the Ukraine war? Russia Launches "Referendums" - They're illegal for three reasons

2022-09-24T04:34:56.325Z


"Point of no return" in the Ukraine war? Russia Launches "Referendums" - They're illegal for three reasons Created: 09/24/2022, 06:20 By: Stephanie Munk Russia wants to declare parts of Ukraine Russian territory in a referendum. The votes are not legal - for several reasons. Moscow - Russia's President Vladimir Putin wants to create facts in occupied areas of Ukraine - and at the same time fur


"Point of no return" in the Ukraine war?

Russia Launches "Referendums" - They're illegal for three reasons

Created: 09/24/2022, 06:20

By: Stephanie Munk

Russia wants to declare parts of Ukraine Russian territory in a referendum.

The votes are not legal - for several reasons.

Moscow - Russia's President Vladimir Putin wants to create facts in occupied areas of Ukraine - and at the same time further escalate the Ukraine war: on Friday, September 23, mock referendums will start in four regions of Ukraine.

They should run until Tuesday, after which a rapid annexation by Moscow is expected.

"Referendums" in eastern Ukraine are internationally condemned as illegal - for several reasons

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken sharply criticized Thursday's "referendums" in the UN Security Council.

"We cannot and will not allow Putin to get away with this," he said.

Michael Roth, chairman of the federal government's foreign affairs committee, spoke in the ZDF morning magazine about a "perverse land grab" and a "breach of international law" that the West would not accept.

He's not the only one with this opinion: Many countries condemn the so-called referendums as illegal - and rightly so.

At least three reasons suggest that the so-called referendums are not compatible with international law.

  • Violation of Ukrainian law:

    The so-called referendums in Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhia are not compatible with Ukrainian law.

    According to Article 73 of the Ukrainian Constitution - which can be read in a translation of the Constitution on vererfassungen.net - "issues of changes in the territory of Ukraine will be decided exclusively by an all-Ukrainian referendum".

    The four regions are therefore not allowed to vote on a possible annexation to Russia on their own.

    International law expert Stefan Talmon also emphasized to

    tagesschau.de

    : "A referendum may only be carried out by Ukraine, i.e. the Ukrainian government."

  • Carrying out the “referendums”:

    The way in which the referenda are carried out in the partially occupied territories does not correspond to democratic principles.

    Occupation forces deployed by Moscow only announced it on Tuesday, September 20.

    Just three days later they start at high speed.

    There is no time for public debate, constituency shaping and independent scrutiny.

    Instead, pro-Russian officials go door-to-door, showing residents ballots to vote on annexation to Russia.

    A free, voluntary and independent vote is hardly given.

    Only on Tuesday - the last day of voting - there should be a vote in polling stations.

  • Voting under martial law:

    As international rights expert Maximilian Bertamini from Ruhr-Uni Bochum emphasized in the ARD program “Tagesschau”, a referendum under martial law is contrary to international law.

    The affected areas are under the military control of the Russian occupiers, and many residents have already fled.

    According to the expert, it is therefore a "perversion" of what is actually a legitimate instrument of peoples' right to self-determination.

    Rather, Russia is pushing referendums "to consolidate territorial gains in the Ukraine war."

The fact that the sham referendums should not be a free, independent decision by the Ukrainian residents also shows that Russia leaves no doubt about the expected result: "Donbass is returning home," triumphed the head of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic, Denis Puschilin, already on Tuesday - three days before voting even began.

Election workers with mobile voting boxes for voting on the front doors leave the embassy of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic in Moscow.

© Alexander Nemenov/AFP

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Putin apparently wants to create facts with the sham referendums and declare the Ukrainian areas to be Russian land.

Russia could then interpret Ukrainian attacks in these areas as an attack on Russian territory - and react accordingly.

The connection of the new areas would give Russia the opportunity to use "all its forces for self-defense," wrote former President Dmitry Medvedev in his Telegram channel. 

Putin himself declared: "If the territorial integrity of our country is threatened, we will definitely use all available means to protect Russia and our people." This can be understood as an indirect threat to Russia's nuclear arsenal.

Bogus referendums mean that a negotiated solution to the Ukraine war is a long way off

In addition, once the affected areas were declared Russian -- and the Russian government has already announced that it will not hesitate to do so -- a negotiated solution to the Ukraine war may be a long way off.

Both Ukraine and its international partners have repeatedly made it clear that they would not accept Ukraine's territorial losses as a result of the war or a "peace dictated by Putin".

The situation in the Ukraine war is thus becoming even more complicated and unsolvable - a "point of no return" that Putin is probably hoping for, as ZDF writes in an analysis.

(smu with material from dpa and AFP)

Source: merkur

All news articles on 2022-09-24

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