Novorossiya (confederation)

For the historical territory of the Russian Empire, see Novorossiya.

Novorossiya New Russia Новороссия (Russian) Новоросія (Ukrainian)
Flag Coat of arms
Anthem: "Живи Новороссия" Zhivi, Novorossiya! on YouTube Template:Ru icon Template:Uk icon "Live, New Russia!"
Territories controlled by DPR and LPR 02/2015.
Status	Self-proclaimed confederation
Official languages	Russian Ukrainian
Religion	Russian Orthodox (official)
Membership	Donetsk People's Republic Luhansk People's Republic
Government	Provisional Confederation
• Speaker of the Parliament	Oleg Tsaryov
• Head of the DPR	Alexander Zakharchenko
• Head of the LPR	Igor Plotnitsky
Confederation between Donetsk and Luhansk

Novorossiya or New Russia (Russian: Новоро́ссия, romanized: Novorossiya, IPA: [nəvɐˈrosʲɪjə]; [Новоросія, Novorosiya] Error: {{Lang-xx}}: text has italic markup (help)), also referred to as the Union of People's Republics (Russian: Сою́з наро́дных респу́блик, romanized: Soyuz Narodnykh Respublik, IPA: [sɐˈjus nɐˈrodnɨx rʲɪˈspublʲɪk]; [Союз народних республік, Soyuz Narodnykh Respublik] Error: {{Lang-xx}}: text has italic markup (help)), is a globally unrecognized breakaway "confederation" of the self-proclaimed Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) and Luhansk People's Republic (LPR) in eastern Ukraine, both of which share a border with Russia.

The two constituent "republics" of the confederation have limited diplomatic recognition and are classified by Ukraine as terrorist organizations. The creation of Novorossiya was declared on 22 May 2014, and agreements were signed between the leaders of the two organizations on 24 May. On 24 June, leaders from the "Supreme Soviet" of each group declared the merger of their constitutions, and the creation of Novorossiya as a confederal "Union of People's Republics". On 1 January 2015 founding leadership announced the project has been put on hold, and on 20 May the constituent groups announced the freezing of the confederation project.

Background

Novorossiya was the name of a territory of the Russian Empire formed from the Crimean Khanate, which had been annexed several years after the Treaty of Küçük Kaynarca concluded the Russo-Turkish War in 1774. Novorossiya initially included today's Southern Ukraine as well as some parts of today's Russia (including Novorossiysk). The region was soon colonized by Ukrainian, Romanian, Russian, German, Greek, Bulgarian, Jewish and other settlers. The major cities were Odessa, Kherson, Mykolaiv, and Novorossiysk.. In 1802 the province of Novorossiya was split into three Governorates. In 1917 most of 18th century Novorossiya was incorporated into the newly proclaimed Ukrainian People's Republic because ethnic Ukrainians constituted the majority of the population. After the defeat of pro-independence Ukrainians in the Ukrainian–Soviet War, the Soviet government confirmed that Southern Ukraine was part of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic.

The Novorossiya movement made its appearance in Odessa in August 1990. The movement, known as the Democratic Union of Novorossiya, argued that given the separate ethnos of the region it should have an autonomous status within a federated Ukrainian state. It campaigned for 'special state status' within 'the historical boundaries of Novorossiya (today's Odessa, Mykolaiv, Kherson, Dnipropetrovs'k and Crimean oblasts, and also part of the Dniester region of the Moldavian SSR). It failed, however, to gain popular support.

In September 1990 Alexander Solzhenitsyn published an article in opposition to the cultural partition of Ukraine and Russia in which he references 'Novorossiya', i.e., "including those regions which have never been part of the traditional Ukraine: the 'wild steppe' of the nomads--the latter "New Russia" [Новороссия]--as well as the Crimea, the Donbass area, and the lands stretching east almost to the Caspian Sea". He argues that "self-determination of peoples" requires that a nation must resolve issues of identity for itself.

By November 1991 representatives from the Odessa, Kherson, Mykolaiv and Crimean oblasts had met in Odessa to discuss the question of forming a new state, 'Novorossiya'. This was necessitated, they explained, by the growth of 'nationalist tendencies' in Ukraine, its increasing isolationism, and diminishing ties with Russia.

Three days after the 1 December 1991 referendum on Ukrainian independence, the mayor of St Petersburg, Anatoly Sobchak, argued that Russia had handed over to Ukraine “a whole series of Russian provinces, the so-called Novorossiya, whose population is for the most part Russian” and that the Russian minority in Ukraine was threatened with forcible 'Ukrainianisation'. Following the collapse of the Soviet Union the term Novorossiya began to be used again in calls for the independence or secession of regions of Ukraine corresponding to different areas.

As late as September 1992, in Odessa, several organizations such as the Civic Movement of Odessa, Rus', the Socialist Party, and Novorossia are campaigning for the establishment of a separate Novorossian region, the exact borders of which were still being debated.

In June 1994 the chairman of the Dniester Republic's supreme council made reference to Crimea, Odessa, and other oblasts as "Novorossiya".

Dmitry Trenin of the Carnegie Moscow Center wrote that in 2005 and again in 2008 some quarters in Moscow, that were not entirely academic, discussed the idea of a Russia-friendly buffer state, "Novorossiya", being formed out of southern Ukraine from the Crimea to Odessa in response to perceived Western penetration into the former Soviet Union.

The term Novorossiya came into usage in 2014 among Antimaidan protesters following the Euromaidan Ukrainian Revolution. A Novorossiya account was created on Twitter and gained thousands of followers in the first weekend.

On 17 April 2014, during talks in Geneva on resolving the rising unrest in southern and eastern Ukraine, President Putin stated at a question and answer session that the territories of Kharkov, Lugansk, Donetsk, Kherson, Nikolayev and Odessa had originally been part of Novorossiya and suggested that they were irresponsibly ceded to Ukraine even though such "cession" happened several centuries ago.

History

Main articles: 2014 pro-Russian unrest in Ukraine and War in Donbass

Formation

Pavel Gubarev (left)

Alexander Zakharchenko, leader of the Donetsk People's Republic, 27 December 2014

The New Russia Party, founded on 13 May 2014 in Donetsk, Ukraine, declared on its first congress of 22 May 2014 the formation of a new self-declared state named 'Novorossiya', inspired by the historical region of the Russian Empire that carried that name. The congress was attended by separatist officials of the Donetsk People's Republic, Donbass People's Militia as well as by the Donetsk Republic leader Pavel Gubarev, ultranationalist/Stalinist writer Alexander Prokhanov, nationalist bolshevist political scientist and Eurasia Party leader Aleksandr Dugin, and Valery Korovin. According to Gubarev the state would include Kharkiv, Kherson, Dnipropetrovsk, Mykolaiv, Odessa and Zaporizhia. Two days later, the self-appointed 'Prime Minister' of Donetsk Alexander Borodai and Luhansk "head of the Republic" Aleksey Karyakin signed a document behind closed doors formalizing their merger into the new confederation.

In an interview on 31 May, Denis Pushilin, then acting as head of state of the Donetsk People's Republic, stated that Novorossiya currently existed as a union of people's republics, but cooperation could be deepened if more territories were to join. On 24 June, the two People's Republics proclaimed their accession to the union of people's republics, and at the second plenum of the new Parliament of Novorossiya on 15 July, the confederation adopted the official name of Novorossiya. Since the 2 November 2014 Donbass parliamentary elections the Parliament did not gather anymore.

Parallel December 2014 declaration

On 12 December 2014, a "Congress of Deputies of All Levels" led by former DPR deputy foreign minister Boris Borisov, alongside figures such as Pavel Gubarev, issued a renewed declaration of the state sovereignty of the "Union of Sovereign Republics" of Novorossiya, claiming it to be an amendment of the 1922 Treaty on the Creation of the USSR. In contrast to the May agreement, the new declaration aimed to build a new executive "from scratch". An official of the DPR responded that although Borisov was well-intentioned, his initiative did not have the material backing necessary for success.

May 2015 collapse of project

On 20 May 2015, the political leadership announced the "collapse" of the project. Speaker for the Parliament Oleg Tsaryov stated that the political project was frozen because the confederation did not comply with the Minsk II accords.

In June 2015, the leaders of DPR and LPR submitted their proposed changes to the Constitution of Ukraine that, while calling for wide autonomy of the Donbass region, considered them as territory of Ukraine along with the Autonomous Republic of Crimea. These changes were later withdrawn, and in a 15 June speech Zakharchenko announced that "the DPR is an autonomous state that is not leaving anywhere".

In mid-June 2015, Igor Girkin said that the situation in Novorossiya was a "colossal failure" no one knew how to patch up, and that the plan was to negotiate the return of the autonomous regions of Donetsk and Lugansk to Ukraine in return for Ukraine's de facto acceptance of the annexation of Crimea to the Russian Federation, for sanctions be gradually withdrawn, and for everything returned to the previous state with the exception of Crimea. According to Girkin, should such a "wonderful" plan be realised, Ukraine would become a federal state. "Consequently, in such a manner, a safety catch would be put in place for its entry to NATO. Russia would get leverage over Kiev in the form of the autonomous regions, and everything would settle down."

Military

Main article: United Armed Forces of Novorossiya

The armed forces of Novorossiya were composed of the Donbass People's Militia and the LPR People's Militia (formerly known as Army of the South-East).

The militias of the Donetsk People's Republic and Luhansk People's Republic, merged into one group on 16 September 2014, forming the "United Armed Forces of Novorossiya".

It is regarded as a terrorist group by the Ukrainian government, and was accused in the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 on 17 July 2014.

International recognition

No country recognized Novorossiya as a sovereign state or political entity. Only two of its components, the Lugansk People's Republic and the Donetsk People's Republic, were recognized on 18 June and 27 June 2014 respectively by South Ossetia, a breakaway republic of Georgia which, itself, was occupied by the Russian Army during the Russo-Georgian War, and has extremely limited recognition.

Controversy

The status of Novorossiya came into dispute on 26 May 2014, when according to Bolotov, "none of the agreements have been concluded" but the intention is to form a "Union of People's Republics".

On 1 January 2015, former Donetsk Republic Prime Minister Alexander Borodai, who resigned on 7 August 2014, stated that "there is no Novorossiya" and that the proposed state was a "dream that was not brought to life" and called it a false start.

Russian dissidents Alexandr Skobov and Andrey Piontkovsky commented that in its political features (nationalism, imperialism) the entity has similarities to 20th-century fascist movements.

See also

• 2014 pro-Russian conflict in Ukraine
• United Armed Forces of Novorossiya
• War in Donbass
• Pavel Gubarev
• Donetsk–Krivoy Rog Soviet Republic
• List of active separatist movements in Europe
• List of active rebel groups
• 2014 Crimean crisis

External links

• Official press releases
• Official website
• Central News Agency Novorossia