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(Bloomberg) — Vladimir Putin vowed his annexation of four occupied regions in Ukraine is irreversible, as the Russian president formalized Europe’s biggest land grab since World War II and accused the West of trying to subjugate his country.
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“They will become our citizens forever,” he told officials in a Kremlin ceremony Friday before he and Moscow-installed leaders signed annexation documents. He demanded Ukraine stop fighting and begin talks, but refused to negotiate about the territories he’s absorbing. “We will use all means available to us to defend our lands,” he said.
The United Nations has denounced the annexation as illegal. Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy condemned it, vowing to press ahead with his counteroffensive. Dialog “is impossible with this Russian president,” he said.
The US added hundreds of Russian officials, including Putin’s top central banker and energy chief, to its sanctions list. “We will rally the international community to both denounce these moves and to hold Russia accountable,” President Joe Biden said in a statement, vowing to continue to provide military aid to Ukraine. The European Union also planned new restrictions.
Offensive Struggling
With his troops losing ground to Kyiv’s attacks, Putin has been struggling to revive his seven-month-old invasion. He’s ordered the mobilization of 300,000 reservists to shore up his battered army, triggering an exodus of Russians trying to avoid being sent to the front.
Putin has brandished the threat of using nuclear weapons to protect Russia’s sovereignty over the newly acquired territories, drawing warnings of harsh retaliation from the US and its allies.
In his speech Friday, Putin didn’t mention nuclear weapons specifically with regard to the defense of the annexed areas. But he denounced the US for using them on Japan in 1945. “The United States is the only country in history that has used nuclear weapons,” he said. “Creating, by the way, a precedent.”
Before the address, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called the talk of nuclear escalation “irresponsible” and declined to say whether attacks on the annexed territories may meet the standard for using the weapons set out in Russia’s military doctrine.
Land Grab
Putin is laying claim to about 15% of Ukraine’s land area, making the move the largest forced annexation in Europe since World War II.
“This is comparable to Austria and Belgium combined. Or Denmark, Belgium and the Netherlands combined. Or 30% of Germany,” Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas said in a statement. “Russia tries to rewrite the map of Europe.”
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Peskov said Putin has no plans to visit the annexed zones at present, Tass reported.
The Russian leader devoted much of the 37-minute address to reiterating his denunciations of the US and its allies for allegedly trying to turn Russia into a “colony. ” Lashing out at what he described as the “pure satanism” of Western liberal values, he said Russia has its own views on the issues of gender and family.
The signing ceremony ended with a smiling Putin holding hands with the four regions’ Kremlin-installed chiefs as he joined in chants of “Russia” in the hall. Later, he took the stage at a celebration concert authorities held on Red Square, saying, “Victory will be ours!”
Russian officials are moving quickly to try to formalize their grip on the occupied areas, promising to issue passports and to appoint senators representing the regions in the upper house of parliament.
In an apparent sign of the hastiness of the latest moves, Kremlin spokesman Peskov said he wasn’t immediately able to say whether Russia will be annexing all of the territory of the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions or just the areas held by its troops. He said the agreements Friday will cover the full areas of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, though Ukraine still controls parts of those.
Kyiv’s allies in the US and Europe have vowed to continue billions of dollars in financial and military aid to support Ukraine’s drive to oust Russian forces. Ukrainian troops closed in on Lyman on Friday, a key transport hub in the Donetsk region, with some analysts suggesting a large number of Moscow’s forces are at risk of being surrounded in the area.
Russia has also stepped up threats to European energy supplies in an effort to sap support there for Ukraine. State gas giant Gazprom warned it may shut off the last pipeline carrying its gas to clients in western Europe, while leaks discovered in the Nord Stream links under the Baltic Sea have raised suspicions of sabotage and fears of attacks on other infrastructure.
Putin blamed “Anglo-Saxons” for sabotage of the pipelines, without citing any evidence. The US rejected the allegation as “absurd.”
A Russian missile strike killed at least 25 civilians near Zaporizhzhia early Friday, Ukrainian officials said. The city is one that Russia has included in the territory it claims to have annexed, although its forces have never reached it. The victims had been lining up in a convoy to travel toward the Russian-occupied zone to evacuate relatives, Ukraine said.
(Updates with Biden quote from fourth paragraph)
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WASHINGTON (Reuters) -The United States has not yet seen Russia take any action that suggests it is contemplating the use of nuclear weapons amid its invasion of Ukraine, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Friday, despite what he called "loose talk" by Russian President Vladimir Putin about their possible use. "This kind of loose talk about nuclear weapons is the height of irresponsibility and it's something that we take very seriously," Blinken said.
This is not something American officials and those close to the White House are usually keen to signal but this week — as Russia made repeated thinly veiled threats to use nuclear weapons over Ukraine — they were. The commander-in-chief has vivid memories of the Korean War. The man making the calls in the situation room came of age during the Cuban Missile crisis.
Hundreds of Russian troops in Ukraine have been encircled in one of their main garrisons, on the verge of one of the worst defeats of the war, overshadowing President Vladimir Putin's celebration to proclaim his annexation of seized land.The pro-Russian leader in Ukraine's Donetsk province acknowledged his forces had lost full control of Yampil and Dobryshev, villages north and east of the city of Lyman, leaving Moscow's main garrison in northern Donetsk "half-encircled".
This content was produced in Russia where the law restricts coverage of Russian military operations in Ukraine. MOSCOW, Sept 30 (Reuters) – Russia's competition watchdog opened a series of investigations on Friday into price rises for military goods as demand rose amid Moscow's drive to enlist hundreds of thousands more Russians for its military operation in Ukraine. The probe concerns rising prices for "ammunition, tactical clothing, sleeping bags, thermal underwear, backpacks, trekking shoes, hiking accessories and other items," the FAS said in a statement.
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The Kremlin said a ceremony will be held on Friday to launch the process of annexing the Ukrainian regions of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia after referendums dismissed as a ‘sham’ by the West
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UK summons Russian ambassador following Putin’s speech
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"We will rally the international community to both denounce these moves and to hold Russia accountable." "We are taking our decisive step by signing Ukraine's application for accelerated accession to NATO."
Cesare Casadei has been backed to bring goals from midfield to the Chelsea side when he gets his first-team opportunity. The 19-year-old joined the Blues in the summer from Inter Milan, one of the signings made by the club with an eye to the future as Todd Boehly brought in a number of talented teenagers. On his Chelsea debut, Casadei was sent off in the Papa John’s Trophy against Sutton United, though he enjoyed a better time of things in his next match as he scored against Everton’s U21 side.
State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin, a key Putin ally, said on the Duma's official Telegram channel that Putin had informed the parliament of official requests by the regions. Russia had held what it called referendums in four partially-occupied areas of Ukraine – Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, and said they had produced overwhelming majorities in favour of joining Russia.