A Putin-style history lecture

The Constitutional Court of Russia rules on the annexation of Ukrainian territory

The Constitutional Court of Russia issued four rulings on Russia’s annexation of the self-proclaimed Luhansk and Donetsk “people’s republics” as well as the Ukrainian territories of Zaporizhia and Kherson. The rulings approved the annexation, one of several necessary procedural steps in making the annexations “official.” The text of the rulings – all nearly identical – features lengthy musings on regional history, similar in style to Putin’s speech about the annexations on September 30. An abridged version of the Court’s words is below.

The Constitutional Court of Russia’s four rulings approving the treaties on “admission into the Russian Federation” of the self-proclaimed LNR, DNR and the Zaporizhia and Kherson regions of Ukraine are practically identical. Below is a highly abridged, but faithful to the original, summary of the parts which enumerate the “obvious and indisputable facts” about the circumstances which led to the signing of the treaties.

Following arbitrary decisions made by Soviet organs of power, the territory of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic was to a large extent formed from lands which had a predominantly Russian population, without an expression of the will of the citizens themselves. Their situation began to deteriorate with the collapse of the USSR. The situation was further aggravated by the unconstitutional armed revolution in Kiev in 2014.

In conditions of acute crisis and de facto external control by the collective West, Ukrainian authorities hinder citizens who identify themselves as belonging to the Russian nation from preserving their national, linguistic, religious, and cultural identities. The state organs of Ukraine merged with structures that instilled the ideology and practice of aggressive nationalism and anti-Russian neo-Nazism.

In 2014, after Crimea and Sevastopol joined the Russian Federation, the population of the Donbas decided on the independence of the LNR and DNR, and then put up armed resistance to the Kiev regime. Attempts at peaceful resolution were thwarted by the Kiev regime, which was preparing for an armed invasion of the territories of the LNR and DNR. On February 24, Russia was forced to launch a preemptive special military operation which, because of the inevitability of the threat, also represented Russia exercising its inalienable right to self-defense.

During the course of the operation, significant territory was liberated, the population of which is determined to exercise its right to self-determination outside of Ukraine. The Kiev regime will not back down from its intention to forcibly regain all territory which was liberated from its authorities, and it threatens citizens who advocate independence with retaliation and repression.

Recognizing faith in goodness and justice as one of the fundamental values of the multinational people of the Russian Federation, and being a legal social government, Russia cannot ignore the facts of mass violation of the right to life and discrimination against people on the grounds of their national and linguistic affiliation, especially on territory with whose residents the population of Russia has enduring historical, cultural, and human connections.

Translation by Emily Laskin