Russian President Vladimir Putin has handed in the Order “For Merit to the Fatherland”, 1st Class, to Lugansk People’s Republic Acting Head Leonid Pasechnik, for the outstanding service in protecting the rights and freedoms of the civilian population from the aggression of Ukrainian nationalists.
“I believe that it’s not just my decoration, it’s a decoration of every resident of the Lugansk People’s Republic,” Pasechnik said at the ceremony in the Kremlin’s St Catherine Hall broadcast by Zvezda TV. “I’d like to express words of deep gratitude personally to you and the whole Russian people, all residents of Russia for the help without which we wouldn't have succeeded as a republic, and it would have been practically impossible for us to survive.”
Donetsk People’s Republic Acting Head Denis Pushilin has been decorated with the same order.
Acting governors of the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions, Yevgeny Balitsky and Vladimir Saldo, have been decorated with the Orders “For Merit to the Fatherland,” 3rd Class.
The Lugansk People’s Republic became a part of Russia on September 30, 2022 following the unification referendum.*i*ie
