President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said Ukraine would defend its citizens in Russian occupied regions, as authorities there announced the results of so-called referendums that have already been denounced by the west.
This farce in the occupied territory can't be called an imitation of referendums, Zelenskiy said on Tuesday in a video posted on Telegram. We will act to protect our people, both in the Kherson region, in the Zaporizhzhia region, in the Donbas, in the currently occupied areas of the Kharkiv region and in Crimea. The Ukraine president said that officials in four Moscow-occupied regions of the country claimed victory in the referendums, which have been condemned by western leaders as sham ballots.
The poll body in the southern Zaporizhzhia region said 93.1% of voters opted for Russian annexation after all ballots were counted, adding that this was a preliminary result.
In Kherson, authorities said 87% of voters voted for Russian annexation after a vote was completed.
In eastern Ukraine's Luhansk region, controlled by pro-Russian separatists, 98.4% opted for annexation by Russia, Russian news agencies said. Leonid Pasechnik, the leader of the self-proclaimed Lugansk People's Republic, said on Telegram that it was clear that Luhansk would return to the Russian fold.
The poll body said that 99.2% of voters voted for Russian annexation after all ballots were counted, according to news agencies.
The US secretary of state, Antony Blinken, said the west would never recognize Russia annexation of Ukrainian territory, which he called part of a diabolical scheme by Moscow.
Nato denounced the referendums as a sham and violation of international law. The United Nations said it was committed to Ukraine's territorial integrity within recognised borders.
In an address to the UN security council, Zelenskiy warned that Ukraine would not be able to negotiate with Russia after the votes.
Russia has recognized the pseudo-referendums as normal implementation of the so-called Crimean scenario, and yet another attempt to annex Ukrainian territory means that there is nothing to talk about, he said in a video message.
Russia is running a farce called a referendum on the occupied territory of Ukraine, in front of the eyes of the whole world.
People are forced to fill out some papers for a TV picture under the muzzles of machine-guns. The figures of the pseudo-referendum were drawn in advance. President Vladimir Putin is expected to address both houses of the Russian parliament on Friday, and may use the address to announce the accession of the Ukraine territories that held referendums into Russia, the British Ministry of Defence said in its latest intelligence update.
Putin said on Tuesday that Russia wanted to save people in the territories.