The official page of the new country is here.
Today, on May 11, 2014, a new nation has been formed in Europe – People’s Republic of Donetsk. The results of a referendum on whether or not the Donetsk region should be part of the Ukraine or should secede from the Ukraine are now in. 89% of voters voted to declare independence from the Ukraine and 10% voted to remain a part of the Ukraine. 1% spoiled their ballots. Turnout was high at 75%. The results lined up very well with an opinion poll taken by several US news organizations the day before which showed that 96% of those planning to vote supported independence.
Ukrainian media said that they capture several “terrorists” in a truck in the region. The Ukrainian forces said that they found 1 million ballots premarked “yes.” Pro-independence forces denounced this as a false flag operation. Ukrainian media also said that they had tapped a phone call between one of the independence leaders and the head of a Russian neo-Nazi organization in which they independence leaders said that he planned to falsify the results in favor of independence and that he had talked to Putin about this. Pro-independence forces said that the phone call never occurred and was made up by Ukrainian media.
Ukrainian media and government has run a very large number of lies during this whole series of events and at any rate, the results line up well with opinion polls.
Soon after the results were announced, the new government said that they would set up their own military and would proceed with what they called an amicable divorce from the Ukrainian state. They also said that they were switching currency from the Ukrainian hryvna to the Russian ruble. The region is heavily industrial and has deep economic ties with Russia. Much of Russia’s raw iron and sheet metal is produced in plants in this region. There are also large coal mines in the Donbass area.
The West condemned the new elections as phony and said that no government would recognized them. It remains to be seen how Russia will react to the declaration of independence. Hopefully they will recognize the new country!
Elections were also ongoing in Lugansk while this post was being written. Turnout is high, but no results are in yet.
The Kharkiv region postponed their independence referendum scheduled for the same day as they said they were not ready to hold the elections yet.
Donetsk is definitely now an independent country in the eyes of its leaders. Whether they will remain an independent nation or ask to be annexed to Russia in the future is not known.
Three other regions of the former USSR are in the same boat. South Ossetia and Abkhazia have declared independence from Georgia after violent rebellions. Russian troops are now placed in both new countries. Both South Ossetia and Abkhazia have offered suggestions that they may wish to annex themselves to Russia in the future.
Eastern Ukraine has never really been a part of anything called the Ukraine. It has always been a part of Russia, called Novorussiya, ever since Russia conquered the region in 1750. It remained a part of Russia after the Bolshevik revolution and was only attached to the Western Ukraine (the Ukrainian SSR) in 1924. It is really just a part of Russia and it has no business being in the Ukraine.
The true Ukrainian state is Western Ukraine from Kiev to the West, especially Galicia, Volhynia, and Bukovina. Bukovina used to be a part of Romania and Galicia and Volhynia were first a part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and then a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. During WW2, the pro-Nazi Banderist Ukrainian nationalists ethnically cleansed most of the Poles out of the region, murdering 100,000 of them in the process.
However, the region of Transcarpathia where the Rusyns live has never really been a part of the real Ukraine and they want no part of this new state. This region recently declared their independence from the Ukraine. Transcarpathia is home to Rusyns, a separate people who speak a language closely related to but separate from Ukrainian. Other groups of Rusyns live in Slovakia and Poland. The ones in Poland are called Lemkos.
All hail the People’s Republic of Donetsk!
