Its forces losing ground by the day to Kyiv’s counteroffensive, Russia said it still hasn’t finalized the borders of two of the four regions of Ukraine that President Vladimir Putin last week claimed as his own.
“As for Kherson and Zaporizhzhia, we will continue to consult with the people who live in those regions,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on a conference call Monday. He declined to elaborate on how that might take place or whether the new frontiers would be set out in separate laws. “I’ve said all I can say on that,” he said when pressed by reporters for clarification.
His comments fuel the uncertainty around Russia’s hastily organized drive to annex the four regions that its troops still partially occupy in Ukraine. Putin signed documents Friday to make them part of Russia “forever,” but the Kremlin at the time said it couldn’t say precisely what the borders of the annexed zones were.
