“Moscow is preparing to annex large additional swathes of Ukrainian territory in the coming days, the United States said on Monday, and could thus seek to consolidate its grip on the east of the country even as Russian military forces struggle to s ‘capturing essential targets’, reports The Washington Post what Tuesday, May 3.
From an official source in Washington, “information ‘very believable’ indicate that Russia will probably organize fraudulent referendums in mid-May, through which the citizens of Donetsk, Luhansk and Kherson will appear to express their wish to leave Ukraine and integrate Russia. After that, Russia will probably install rulers loyal to Moscow at the head of these territories.”
In Kherson, in southern Ukraine, the Kremlin seemed to prepare for this scenario by announcing a transition to the ruble, the Russian currency.
In the Donbass, the Russian army would trample
As the American newspaper reminds us, such an initiative “would echo the annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean peninsula in 2014, with one crucial difference: forces loyal to Ukraine are fighting to retain control of their territory.” According to a Pentagon source, the Russian offensive in the Donbass is hardly progressing.
Just before the start of the invasion, Vladimir Putin had already recognized the independence of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, of which only part of the territory was controlled by the separatists.