This week Moscow's Foreign Minister Lavrov announced that Russia is aiming for further geographic conquests in Ukraine. According to British intelligence, the targets already existed in this form - and Lavrov wanted to do something completely different.
The British intelligence services contradict the recent account by the Russian foreign minister Sergey Lavrov, according to which Russia has expanded its targets in Ukraine. Lavrov had announced in the middle of the week that the mission was no longer just about the self-proclaimed People's Republics of Donetsk and Luhansk, but also about the Cherson and Zaporizhia regions and "a number of other areas". Lavrov cited Western arms deliveries to Ukraine as the reason for adjusting the targets.
"That is almost certainly not correct," write the British secret services in their most recent situation report. Russia has not expanded its war. "Taking long-term control of these areas was almost certainly a goal from the very beginning of the invasion."
The British secret services suspect a strategy behind Lavrov's statements. "Russia invaded the territories in February and occupation authorities have been publicly discussing the prospects for legal and independent referendums since at least mid-March," the report said. "There is a reasonable chance that Lavrov made the statements to pave the way for referendums in occupied territories beyond Luhansk and Donetsk."
In the two regions, as well as in those of Cherson and Zaporizhia, there had already been announcements and statements about planned referendums, mostly by pro-Russian separatists or governors or a military administration loyal to Moscow. The Ukrainian government assumes that referendums such as those in the annexed Crimea are only possible with Moscow's approval.
While Ukraine is killing tens of thousands in a brutal war of aggression, Russia's official reception is quite different. Russia invaded Ukraine on February 24, but still does not use the word "war" for it, presenting itself primarily as a victim of a western threat Moscow's "geographical goals" would move even further away from the current front if the West continued to "gun-load" Ukraine.
