The separatist public chamber in Lugansk asked the leader of the republic recognized by Russia, Leonid Pasechnik, and the People’s Assembly to immediately organize a nationwide poll on the recognition of the republic as a Russian entity, Sputnik reports.

The statement notes that “The Public Chamber of the Luhansk People’s Republic puts forward an initiative to immediately hold a referendum on the recognition of the Luhansk People’s Republic as a subject of the Russian Federation.”

Donbass witnessed the creation of the Donetsk People’s Republic and the Luhansk People’s Republic in 2014 unilaterally, and Donbass belonged to Russia before the formation of the Soviet Union. And its dependence was transferred to Soviet Ukraine by decision of the Soviet government. Ukraine retained this and other areas that were part of Malorossiya (Little Russia) until the creation of the Union of Soviet Republics when it seceded from the Soviet Union in 1991.

Russia launched its own military operation in Ukraine on February 24, and Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that the purpose of the operation was “to protect people who have been subjected to abuse and genocide by the Kyiv regime for 8 years.”