kraine calls on the West for new tough sanctions On Russia and to increase his stockpiles of heavy weapons to punish Moscow for his citizenship order.
On Monday, Russian leader Vladimir Putin signed a decree extending rapid access to Russian citizenship for all Ukrainians.
The Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has said that the move by the Kremlin was a violation of the sovereignty of the country and contrary to the principles of international law.
Until recently, only people living in Ukraine’s only eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk were eligible, as well as people in the southern regions of Zaporizhia and Kherson – large parts of which are under Russian control.
But now Moscow has extended the Russian naturalization procedure to all Ukrainian citizens.
Between 2019, when the procedure was first introduced for residents of Donetsk and Luhansk, and this year, more than 720,000 residents of the rebel-held areas in the two regions — about 18 percent of the population — received Russian passports.
At the end of May this year, three months after Russia invaded Ukraine, the accelerated procedure was also offered to residents of the Zaporizhzhya and Kherson regions.
The first Russian passports are said to have been distributed there a month ago, while reports have also surfaced that Ukrainian passports of some citizens have been seized.
Some believe this is part of Puin’s political influence strategy, which involved the introduction of the Russian ruble into occupied territory in Ukraine and could lead to the annexation of more Ukrainian territory.
In 2014, Russia annexed the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea to the Black Sea. The citizenship announcement came hours after the heavy shelling of Kharkiv on Monday.
Three rocket attacks on Ukraine’s second-largest city left at least six dead and 31 injured. The Russian Defense Ministry said the attacks took place where Ukrainian “nationalist battalions” were deployed, while Kharkov regional governor Oleh Syniehubov said the shelling came from multiple rocket launchers, and among the injured were children of were only four years old. missile destroyed a school, another hit a residential building, while the third landed near warehouse facilities.
The Russian attacks continued in eastern Ukraine, with Serhiy Haidai, the regional governor of Luhansk, saying Russian forces carried out five rocket attacks and four shelling, hitting settlements on the border with the Donetsk region. The Luhansk and Donetsk regions form the eastern industrial heart of Ukraine. such as the Donbas, where separatist rebels have been fighting Ukrainian troops since 2014.
Earlier this month, Russia captured the last major stronghold of the Ukrainian resistance in Luhansk, the city of Lysychansk.