What is annexation?

ON SEPTEMBER 30TH Vladimir Putin signed documents to annex four partially occupied Ukrainian provinces—Kherson, Zaporizhia, Donetsk and Luhansk. Sham referendums had been conducted at gunpoint there, with little pretence of legitimacy. According to the Kremlin, in each province at least 87% of voters (and a preposterous 99% in Donetsk) voted for the land where they lived to become part of Russia. In his speech Mr Putin did not use the word “annex”, but he did claim that the territory (some 17% of Ukraine) would be “our citizens forever”. In reality Russia has no right to this territory. Its claim to Crimea, a strategic peninsula it occupied in 2014, is similarly bogus. But in both cases Mr Putin has presented the illegal act as reunification, not annexation. What is annexation, and why is it important to use the word?

Under international law, annexation is when one country forcibly asserts control and sovereignty over another country’s territory. This usually follows military occupation. Annexation is unilateral. Territorial control is declared by the occupying power; the other party gets no say. (If a territory gives up control to another, that is called cession.) Russia claims that the four Ukrainian territories it is annexing have acceded to Russian control, as demonstrated by the results of the sham referendums. In Russia this is presented as the correction of a historical wrong. Mr Putin has claimed on multiple occasions that Russians and Ukranians are one people with a common heritage dating back to the time of Kyivan Rus, a medieval political federation covering present-day Belarus, Ukraine and part of Russia. It is an empty justification for a war of imperial conquest.