<mediadc-video-embed data-state="{"cms.site.owner":{"_ref":"00000161-3486-d333-a9e9-76c6fbf30000","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b93390000"},"cms.content.publishDate":1654631354445,"cms.content.publishUser":{"_ref":"00000165-15c6-d22c-a1ef-97efc26a0001","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b933a0007"},"cms.content.updateDate":1654631354445,"cms.content.updateUser":{"_ref":"00000165-15c6-d22c-a1ef-97efc26a0001","_type":"00000161-3461-dd66-ab67-fd6b933a0007"},"rawHtml":"
var _bp = _bp||[]; _bp.push({ "div": "Brid_54631011", "obj": {"id":"27789","width":"16","height":"9","video":"1026860"} }); ","_id":"00000181-3fb6-df81-a381-7fb6c3610000","_type":"2f5a8339-a89a-3738-9cd2-3ddf0c8da574"}”>Video EmbedRussian President Vladimir Putin is poised to formalize the annexation of a key Ukrainian district occupied earlier this year, as a pro-Russian resident given a leadership role in the occupation government has signaled that Moscow will repeat the political maneuver that the Kremlin used to create a justification for control of the Crimean Peninsula in 2014.
“Crimea, as we say, is the best way of returning to the home harbor,” said Kirill Stremousov, the deputy head of Russia’s military-civilian administration in the Kherson region, according to Russian state media. “In all likelihood, the Kherson Region will follow in Crimea’s footsteps.”
Stremousov, a pro-Russian blogger wanted for treason by the Ukrainian central government, likewise revealed plans to integrate Kherson into the Russian banking sector. The annexation of Kherson would represent a dramatic rebuff of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s offer to begin peace talks if Russian forces withdraw to the territory they held prior to the launch of the offensive in February and signal Putin’s intentions for any territory he is able to seize in the neighboring Donbas region.
“Stalemate is not an option for us,” Zelensky told the Financial Times on Tuesday. “We cannot go on living in this position in hostilities. … But we have already lost too many people in order to simply to cede our territory. That is not possible.”
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Zelensky reiterated his willingness to hold “direct negotiations” with Putin — “in the Russian Federation these days, there is no one to talk to except President Putin,” he said — but the Kremlin has responded to the defeat of Russian forces around Kyiv by concentrating on expanding Russian military holdings in eastern Ukraine.
“The enemy continues to suffer significant losses during hostilities on the territory of Ukraine,” Ukrainian defense officials said in a Sunday update on the fighting. “In order to replenish units, Russian invaders continue forced mobilization measures in the temporarily occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts.”
The annexation of the Kherson region would suggest that Putin seeks the long-term subjugation of the Ukrainian territory linking Donbas (as Donetsk and Luhansk together are known) and Crimea. Russian officials oversaw a so-called “referendum” in Crimea just days after Russian special forces seized the peninsula in 2014, but the United Nations and trans-Atlantic allies have refused to recognize the vote on the grounds that it was an illegitimate fig-leaf for an unprovoked military operation.
“By early March, Russian troops had secured the entire peninsula. On March 6, the Crimean Supreme Council voted to ask to accede to Russia,” former U.S. Ambassador to Ukraine Steven Pifer recalled. “The council scheduled a referendum for March 16, which offered two choices: join Russia or return to Crimea’s 1992 constitution, which gave the peninsula significant autonomy. Those who favored Crimea remaining part of Ukraine under the current constitution had no box to check.”
The Kherson region is particularly important for Crimea because it offers control of the canal that delivers fresh water to the peninsula near the Black Sea.
“Russia is here forever,” Russian politician Andrey Turchak, a senior member of Putin’s United Russia party, said in May. “There should be no doubt about this. There will be no return to the past.”
Zelensky argued that Ukrainian forces have superior morale but lack the weaponry they need to drive the Russians back from the territory they have managed to take over the last two months.
“The advancement, the de-occupation of our territories depends on powerful weapons, political support from the West, and a clear, strong sanctions policy,” he said Tuesday. “We have greater desire, but less technology. Therefore, we cannot advance powerfully. This is an extremely important position, a way out of the stalemate.”
The United States and Western European allies have provided billions of dollars of military equipment to Ukraine, but they have limited the quality of those weapons based on the calculation that some of the heavy weapons that Ukraine most desires might provoke Russia to retaliate against the West.
“We must not humiliate Russia so that the day when the fighting stops, we can build an exit ramp through diplomatic means,” French President Emmanuel Macron argued last week. “I am convinced that it is France’s role to be a mediating power.”
Zelensky was contemptuous of that argument when asked to respond to Macron’s comments.
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“Some people want to be leaders, but in order to be a leader, you do not need to consider yourself one, but to behave as a leader,” he said. “If you want to put an end to this war, you can be a leader of this process. … So apart from words, you should manifest what actually you could do — provide weapons support, bring Putin to the negotiating table beside Ukraine … and influence the process to ensure that there is not just rhetoric about achieving a ceasefire.”
