Russian-backed separatists in the eastern Ukraine region of Luhansk are set to hold a referendum on joining Russia ‘in the near future’.
This has prompted a severe rebuke from Ukraine which vowed ‘total’ guerrilla warfare to prevent the country from splitting into two.
Ukraine rebel leader Leonid Pasechnik on Sunday said the eastern region of Luhansk is set to hold a referendum on whether to join Russia, Daily Mail reports.
Pasechnik, the head of the self-proclaimed Luhansk People’s Republic, said the referendum could come ‘in the nearest time,’ asking voters whether they support making the region part of Russia.
The referendum could mark a precursor to the formal annexation of more Ukrainian territory by Russia, as it did in Crimea after Russia seized the Ukrainian peninsula in 2014.
Crimeans voted overwhelmingly to break with Ukraine and join Russia – a vote that most of the world refuses to recognise.
The move prompted Ukraine’s military intelligence chief to accuse Russia of wanting to split Ukraine in two, as happened with North and South Korea.
“In fact, it is an attempt to create North and South Korea in Ukraine,” Kyrylo Budanov, the head of Ukrainian military intelligence, said in a statement, referring to the division of Korea after World War Two.
“In addition, the season of a total Ukrainian guerrilla safari will soon begin. Then there will be one relevant scenario left for the Russians, how to survive,” he said.
Vladimir Putin last month recognised the eastern regions of Luhansk and Donetsk, where pro-Russian separatists began fighting Ukrainian forces in 2014, as ‘independent’.
Putin used the apparent protection of the two eastern Ukrainian regions as a pretext to start their barbaric invasion on Ukraine.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian forces repulsed seven Russian attacks in Luhansk and destroyed several tanks and armoured vehicles, the General Staff of Ukraine’s Armed Forces said on Sunday.
Firefighters respond to a large-scale fire at a warehouse following shelling in Severodonetsk, Luhansk region, Ukraine.
Firefighters respond to a large-scale fire at a warehouse following shelling in Severodonetsk, Luhansk region, Ukraine.
After more than four weeks of conflict, Russia has failed to seize any major Ukrainian city and Moscow signalled on Friday it was scaling back its ambitions to focus on securing the Donbass region of eastern Ukraine, where Russian-backed separatists have been fighting the Ukrainian army for the past eight years.
Russia has supported the separatist rebels in Luhansk and the neighbouring Donetsk regions since an insurgency erupted there in 2014 shortly after Moscow’s annexation of the Crimean Peninsula.
In talks with Ukraine, Moscow has urged it to acknowledge Russia’s sovereignty over Crimea and the independence of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions.
