TeaThe Kremlin-backed leaders of Ukraine’s four Russian-occupied territories were in Moscow on Thursday, calling on President Vladimir Putin to formally annex the regions to Russia.
Moscow-founded chiefs of Ukraine’s Lugansk, Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhya regions claimed residents supported the move in a hastily held vote, which the West calls a sham.
“I’m already in Moscow,” Leonid Pasechnik, leader of the Lugansk region, told state news agency TASS on Thursday.
Moscow-backed separatists have controlled large parts of Lugansk and neighboring Donetsk since 2014 when Russia annexed the Crimean peninsula.
A Moscow-appointed official of the Kherson region said a meeting is planned between Putin and the heads of the occupied territories.
“A meeting with the president is definitely scheduled. I don’t have that information right now, I can’t say where, what, when,” he told a pro-Kremlin radio program.
On February 24, Russian troops took control of Kherson in southern Ukraine shortly after Moscow sent troops into the country.