US envoy: Russia intends to ‘dissolve’ Ukraine from world map

Tanks of the 2nd Army Corps of the People’s Militia of the Luhansk People’s Republic on a mission at an undisclosed location in Ukraine (Russian Defence Ministry Press Service/AP)

The US ambassador to the United Nations has said there should no longer be any doubt that Russia intends to dismantle Ukraine “and dissolve it from the world map entirely”.

Linda Thomas-Greenfield told the UN Security Council that the United States is seeing growing signs that Russia is laying the groundwork to attempt to annex all of the eastern Ukrainian regions of Donetsk and Luhansk and the southern Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions, including by installing “illegitimate proxy officials in Russian-held areas, with the goal of holding sham referenda or decree to join Russia”.