On September 19-20, the Kremlin gauleiters began talking about the need to immediately hold a “referendum” on the inclusion of regions in the Russian Federation. Ukraine’s Resistance Center explains why the Russians felt such an urgent need.
In August, a material was published on the website of Ukraine’s Resistance Center, where we explained in detail why Russians need the “referendum”. In short:
- The Kremlin continues to follow the Nazi tradition of this way of “legalizing” the occupation;
- At the same time, the organization of the fake manifestation of will does not have any legal status, and has a purely propagandistic meaning.
- The aim is to create an illusion of local support for the occupation.
At that time, the Russians planned to hold a “referendum” on September 11 but later abandoned this date. The reason given was the need to ensure security in the region and the need to “liberate” the entire Donetsk region. Although in fact, the reason lies in the successes of the Armed Forces of Ukraine and total resistance from the locals, and therefore the lack of support and the inability to even imitate the turnout and interest of the residents of the TOT in the occupation.
But a week later, the Kremlin’s rhetoric changed and now the “referendum” must take place immediately. At the same time, they promise to conduct “voting” online. That is, Kremlin propagandists realized that they would not be able to draw a turnout, and decided to simply hide the process. What has changed in a few weeks?
Gauleiters en masse declare the need to hold a “referendum”, because during this time the enemy has carried out “regrouping” in the Kharkiv region, has a threatening position on the right bank of the Dnieper (including Kherson), and no longer controls all the settlements of Luhansk region.
At the same time, Russian officials begin to threaten nuclear weapons and mobilization. As they say, when these regions become part of the Russian Federation, in Moscow’s understanding, an attack on them will give grounds for the use of nuclear weapons. In fact, the Kremlin wants to use its propaganda shows to increase the pressure and raise the stakes in this war.
Officially, Russia denies its failures at the front, and with such panicked statements about the “referendum” it admits its inability to solve the goals that its leadership is creating. Moreover, the occupiers themselves doubt their ability to hold the captured territories.
Fairy tales about the referendum are needed only for threats and a desperate attempt to “fix” the result of the invasion. However, we emphasize once again that the only referendum on the temporarily occupied territories recognized by the whole world, including the Russian Federation itself, took place in 1991. While the online farce will not help Moscow and will not be recognized by the world.
It will be recalled that earlier Ukraine’s Resistance Center published the lists of members of the “electoral commissions”, which help Russians to organize “shows of will”.
