The Constitutional Court of Russia approved the annexation of the occupied regions of Ukraine. The decision states that after the collapse of the USSR, due to “arbitrary decisions of the Soviet authorities”, people who “identify themselves as the Russian people” began to be subjected to harassment on national, linguistic, religious and cultural grounds. The text of the decision is given by RBC.
“As a result of the arbitrary decisions of the Soviet authorities, the territory of the Ukrainian SSR was largely formed from lands with a predominantly Russian population, without the will of the citizens themselves. If in a single state, which in essence was the USSR, this in itself practically did not entail a violation of the rights of citizens living in the respective territories, then in connection with the collapse of the Union, their actual and legal situation began to change for the worse.
The situation was especially aggravated after the armed anti-constitutional coup in Kyiv in 2014. In the context of an acute socio-economic and political crisis, as well as the establishment of de facto external control by the collective West, the Ukrainian authorities have pursued and continue to pursue a targeted policy that prevents those citizens who identify themselves as belonging to the Russian people from maintaining their national, linguistic, religious and cultural identity."