Jamie Dettmer reports on the plebiscites that pro-Russian separatists held in eastern Ukraine yesterday:
The separatists used all the now familiar techniques—including weeks of armed and thuggish intimidation, the abductions and murder of opponents, multiple voting, pre-filled ballot papers, adding names to an incomplete electoral roll and allowing anyone who turned up at a polling station with a Ukrainian passport in hand to cast a ballot.
In the circumstances the separatists were restrained with their referendum result: an 89 percent majority for secession and 10 percent against on a 74.7 percent turnout. A Soviet-style majority but not as unabashed as Crimea’s supposed 97 percent secession triumph in March.
In neighboring Luhansk, one of the poorest Ukrainian regions, where similar plebiscite tactics have been employed, the leader there, Valery Bolotov, at least had the decency to appear to go through the motions of actually counting votes, and so a result will be declared later Monday. No one is in doubt about which way that vote will go, either. Luhansk separatists hint their turnout was even higher yesterday—79 percent.
Separatist leaders in both regions are now saying they will not participate in the presidential elections scheduled for May 25 and will seek to become part of Russia:
Denis Pushilin, the self-styled governor of the “People’s Republic of Donetsk” said the presidential election “will not happen” in the Donetsk region, AFP news agency reported. A separatist leader from Luhansk also said the presidential vote will not be held in the region. “As of today, we are now the Republic of Luhansk, which believes it to be inappropriate and perhaps even stupid to hold a presidential election,” Russia’s RIA news agency quoted him as saying. …
Only Russia is likely to recognise the “People’s Republic of Donetsk” and the Kremlin has already said it “respects the expression of the people’s will” there. On Monday, however, the Kremlin made it clear that Moscow has no intention of immediately annexing the regions. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s office urged the Ukrainian government to engage in talks with representatives of eastern Ukraine that could be brokered by the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe.
The referendum results, of course, contrast sharply with independent polling:
A poll released last week by Pew Research found that 70 percent of respondents in the east – and 58 percent of Russian-speaking eastern respondents – wanted Ukraine to remain whole. Only 18 percent of easterners, and 27 percent of eastern Russian-speakers, said the eastern regions should be allowed to secede.
The Pew findings appear to roughly match an April poll on attitudes in southeastern Ukraineconducted by the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS). Both found high dissatisfaction with Kiev’s governance, but little appetite for outright independence.
Sunday’s referendums only took place in the two easternmost regions of Ukraine. The two earlier polls considered attitudes in a much larger portion of eastern Ukraine – 11 regions by Pew, eight by KIIS. However, for the referendum results to square with the earlier polls, support for secession would have to be miniscule outside of the Lugansk and Dontesk regions.
But Berman notices that the international press has covered the votes as though they were legitimate:
Ukraine rebels hold referendums in Donetsk and Luhansk, says the BBC. Ukraine: pro-Russia separatists set for victory in eastern region referendum, is how the Guardian reports such a shocking prospect. Ukraine regions hold sovereignty vote, announces the Boston Globe. Ukraine’s eastern regions vote on self-rule, notes the Hindu. As for coverage of the results, Yahoo was big offender with its headline, Voters Turn Their Backs on Ukraine, given that we have little more idea of what the voters in the region want than we did a week ago.
Notice anything? Regardless of the content of the articles, the basic presumption has been to note the controversy about the referendums, provide several interviews with yes voters, and maybe note for a second or two the glaring problems with the process, which the Guardian sneaks into the middle of it’s piece. Nonetheless, the vast majority of the coverage has taken the referendums seriously as a major event, even though in many of the cities such as Mariupol, the rebels only control a single building, and had only four ballot boxes set up for a city of 500,000.
Bershidsky looks at the bigger picture:
It’s not the referendums or the Russian military threat that Ukraine, and its Western neighbors, should worry about now. Moscow sympathizes with the rebellion, but deposed president Viktor Yanukovych’s friends need it much more than Putin needs another headache. In an interview with Russia’s state-owned Rossiyskaya Gazeta, Pavel Gubarev, one of the rebels’ leaders, unexpectedly accused many of his comrades-in-arms of taking money from Rinat Akhmetov, Ukraine’s richest man and a long-time Yanukovych ally. Politicians from Yanukovych’s Regions Party have recently stepped up calls for the withdrawal of Kiev’s troops from eastern Ukraine. The losers of last winter’s revolution are hoping to turn the east into a successful version of the Vendee, the province that rose up against the Great Revolution in France in 1793.
Kiev needs to concentrate on counteracting that.
The Dish 