Andrzej Duda, the Polish president, has vowed that Poland will never recognise Russia’s annexation of Ukrainian territory.
Vladimir Putin on Friday formally announced the annexation of four regions of Ukraine: Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson, and Zaporizhzhia citing the results of referendums carried out by the Russians in the occupied territories on September 23-27, which the West has dismissed as shams.
Reacting to the news, Duda wrote on Twitter that “Poland condemns RUS attempts to annex UA territory and will never recognise them.”
“We will continue to support the Defenders of UA until the aggressor is driven out,” he pointed out in his tweet.
“Today’s desperate action by the Kremlin is a defeat for those who naively believed in a compromise with RUS,” Duda added.
The Polish Foreign Ministry published a statement also dismissing the Kremlin’s land grabs.
“The Ukrainian oblasts of Kherson, Donetsk, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia remain part of Ukraine in the light of international law,” the ministry said.
“The Republic of Poland does not recognise and will not recognise the results of the pseudo-referendums carried out in these areas on September 23-27 this year, nor the Russian president’s decrees regarding the annexation of these regions announced on September 29 and 30 this year,” the statement read.
The ministry added that it “absolutely recognises the territorial integrity of Ukraine within internationally recognised borders” and called for further sanctions to be imposed on Russia.
In a related matter, Marlena Malag, the labour and family minister, told PAP on Friday that Poland had decided to lift the facilitated access of Russians to the Polish labour market amid the Kremlin’s military actions in Ukraine, migratory risks from Russia and the growing fears of a Russian hybrid attack on Poland.
“Permits for seasonal work at preferential terms will no longer be issued to Russian citizens. The simplified procedure of declarations on entrusting work to a foreigner will not apply to them,” she said.