By: Samuel Lin

On Friday, September 30th, Putin gave a speech at St. George’s Hall in Moscow and signed treaties to falsely annex 4 regions equivalent to 15% of Ukraine: Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia.

In his speech, Putin claimed that the regions “made a choice to be with their people, be with the homeland.” Ukraine and other nations disagree with Putin because and Russia are two different countries with different people, so Ukraine and Russia are not one people nor one homeland. Putin also stated that Ukrainians in Russian-occupied areas voted to be annexed to Russia, but this is most likely an illegitimate vote.

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, the U.S, and other leading countries refuse to recognize the annexation as legitimate, calling it a “sham”.

In response to Russia’s annexation, Ukraine is accelerating its application process for the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, or NATO. So far, nine different NATO countries, including Poland and Romania, support Ukraine’s application. Yet, many other countries are reluctant to accept Ukraine into NATO. NATO cannot technically accept any countries at war, and many nations fear Ukraine joining NATO could exacerbate international tensions.

Putin, in a speech on TV, threatened to use nuclear weapons. “If the territorial integrity of our country is threatened, we will, without doubt, use all available means to protect Russia and our people. This is not a bluff,” Putin said. This means that if Putin has to defend his country using lethal nuclear weapons, he will do so.

Some countries, such as the U.S and the U.K, are putting new sanctions on Russia because of the annexation. The U.S. put sanctions on 14 major companies which supplied Russia’s military. The U.K banned the exportation of major goods to Russia that would be important to Russia’s industry. Furthermore, the U.K will no longer be providing building, engineering or other services to Russia.

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