The State Duma lower house of the Russian parliament has passed the law on establishing a new commemorative date - September 30 - as Day of Reunification of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics and the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions with Russia.
House speaker Vyacheslav Volodin said that residents of the new regions “courageously defended their right to speak their native language, their history, faith and culture for many years.”
“They chose to be together with Russia,” Volodin said. “It is right that the day when they returned home is forever etched in people’s memory. The State Duma
passed the president-proposed law on a priority basis. All the factions unanimously supported the decision.”
“September 30, 2022 will do down in the recent history as day of accession to the Russian Federation of the Donetsk People’s Republic, the Lugansk People’s Republic, the Zaporozhye region and the Kherson region as constituent entities of the Russian Federation,” said the explanatory note to the document.
The event is based on historical community of the peoples living in the territories of the above republics and regions, results from the expression of will by millions of people, the realization of their inalienable right to determine their political status freely and without outside interference and carry out their economic, social and cultural development, the authors of the document said.
Earlier, President Vladimir Putin suggested establishing Day of Reunification for the LPR, the DPR and the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions on September 30. LPR Acting Head Leonid Pasechnik thanked the president for the initiative. *i
