(Reuters) – Referendums on joining Russia began on Friday in four regions of Ukraine controlled by Moscow and pro-Russian separatist forces, consultations condemned by Westerners who see them as a disguised annexation.
Ukraine and its allies have warned that they will not recognize the result of these referendums organized until Tuesday in the areas under Russian control in the regions of Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhya, representing 15% of Ukrainian territory.
NATO has denounced a “travesty of voting” while Ukraine, Western leaders and the United Nations have condemned the referendums. They will be held in the absence of independent observers and a large part of the population has fled since the start of the war.
The idea of these referendums has been mooted for months by Moscow, but Ukraine’s recent military victories have prompted the pro-Russian authorities to organize them earlier than planned.
Serhi Gaidai, governor of Ukraine’s Luhansk region, said Russian authorities have banned people from leaving the town of Starobilsk until Tuesday and armed groups have been sent to search homes and coerce people into participating. in the referendum.
According to him, in the city of Bilovodsk, a company manager told employees that voting was compulsory and that anyone who refused to participate would be fired and their name given to the security services.
Serhi Gaïdaï also said that people were forced to fill in “sheets of paper” without privacy in the kitchens and courtyards of residential buildings.
“The vote has started for the referendum on the Zaporizhia region which will become part of Russia as a constituent entity of the Russian Federation! We are going home!”, declared Vladimir Rogov, an official of the administration of the region based in Russia.
Voting is also being organized for residents who fled the occupied territories at some 20 polling stations in Moscow, including at the embassy of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, a Russian lawmaker has said.
(Reuters offices, French version Jean-Stéphane Brosse and Augustin Turpin, editing by Nicolas Delame and Kate Entringer)
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