@Bjerknes According to this analysis Putin wants the separatists regions in Ukraine to stay part of Ukraine and to use them as leverage in his influence over Ukraine. The clip is from April 2021 when the tensions were high again.
- Infrastructure is destroyed there.
- Ecology is fucked also. This region was a main mining region and Russians just flooded mines, meaning toxic water is now going to rivers. It's an ecological disaster.
- The most active and productive part of our population left, most of them to other parts of Ukraine (strange how it works, eh), and they've already settled.
- Having this region in Ukraine would allow Russia to continue diversions and have some puppets here.
- They've actually never wanted them in the first place, this region was monetary deficient even before 2014, but with local coal mines going obsolete it was already heading into depression.
