Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry spokesperson Heorhii Tykhyi rejected calls for a referendum on potential territorial concessions, saying votes held under occupation serve as instruments of annexation rather than expressions of popular will.
Responding on Monday to La France Insoumise party leader and candidate in the 2027 French presidential election, Jean-Luc Melenchon, Tykhyi recalled that more than 90% of Ukrainians backed independence within “its current, internationally recognized borders” in the 1991 referendum, including 83% in Donbass. He added that no democratic country would accept such a process “for its own borders, so it should not be proposed to Ukrainians.”
In a speech on November 7, Melenchon had proposed consulting residents in the Donbass region on whether they wanted to remain part of Ukraine or become part of Russia under a potential territorial settlement.