Kherson and Mariupol were 50% Russian before the war. They never got asked what they wanted. The borders don’t reflect demographics and need to be shifted so they do. If people don’t want to live under Russian rule, we should be willing to facilitate their move to Ukrainian areas. That’s a lot better than shipping $40 billion in foreign aid to Ukrainian oligarchs so they can pad their Swiss bank accounts
“They never got asked what they wanted”
Er, yes they did. In 1991. Moreover, their constitution doesn’t just provide a clear mechanism for Oblast ACCESSION like America’s Constitution does for States, it provides for devolution and secession. In all three cases, a NATIONAL referendum is required.
The Ukrainian Constitutional mechanism required the endorsement across 2/3 of Ukraine’s Oblasts to hold a NATIONAL referendum if the proposed referendum question involves alteration of the sovereignty and/or territory of Ukraine. It has to - because the Budapest Memorandum has to be upheld by all its signatories, and it’d be nonsensical for USA, Russia and UK to be bound to its obligations if regions within Ukraine could unilaterally mess about with their own borders.
In America, the Constitution imbues Congress with a very similar power and a very similar constraint. For example, the Colorado statehood bid failed in 1867 despite a majority vote (29 “yes”, 19 “no” and four “absent”). That vote needed to have a 2/3 majority to be passed.
Can a non-state join the USA purely on the basis of a rigged internal referendum that only asked some counties not others if they wanted to join? Could it succeed without a 2/3 majority in Congress under those circumstances. Of course not. Likewise, if a secession mechanism existed in the USA along the exact same lines, could a State hold a rigged vote for secession, exclude several counties from exercising its right to vote, and expect Congress to ratify the referendum result? Again, of course not.
If those referenda in Ukraine had been held in America, they’d have been ruled unconstitutional, and Congress wouldn’t have upheld them.
Constitution of Ukraine: https://www.refworld.org/pdfid/44a280124.pdf as it now stands.
From 2013, an EU review. https://www.legislationline.org/download/id/7795/file/Ukraine_law_national_referendum_2012_en.pdf provides clarification on how it works in practice.
Article 72: ... An All-Ukrainian referendum is called on popular initiative on the request of no less than three million citizens of Ukraine who have the right to vote, on the condition that the signatures in favour of designating the referendum have been collected in no less than two-thirds of the oblasts, with no less than 100 000
signatures in each oblast.
Article 73: Altering the territory of Ukraine IS resolved exclusively by an All-Ukrainian referendum.
Kherson can secede from Ukraine if Ukraine agrees to hold a national referendum. The national referendum CANNOT exclude Ukrainians or Russians from voting. It MUST allow mechanisms for residents of Kherson who’re not actually in Kherson at the time of the referendum, to cast their vote.
If Russia’s rigged referendum intimidates Ukrainian voters, gives votes to visiting Russians, and prevents the tens of thousands of rightful property-owners who fled from Kherson but still officially live there from voting, then its referendum will be completely unconstitutional and no international monitor will sign it off. Russia can fiddle it any way it likes to guarantee a 90% vote for independence, and it’ll still be a bullshit referendum with no standing either in Ukraine or in the eyes of the international community.