Status verified as of 20 September 2026. Political positions change; this explainer describes the documented position on that date.
Current international position
Russia administers parts of Donetsk and Luhansk as annexed territory, a status the UN General Assembly declared invalid in 2022 and which the great majority of states do not recognize; other parts remain under Ukrainian government administration. The dispute remains unresolved amid the wider Russia-Ukraine war.[1]
Sources for this page
Each number marks a specific claim. Notes give the source, its locator and how it relates to the claim.
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1.
Claim: On 12 October 2022, UN General Assembly Resolution ES-11/4 condemned Russia's organization of the 23-27 September 2022 "illegal so-called referendums" in Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia and the subsequent attempted annexation; declared these acts to have no validity under international law and incapable of altering the regions' status; called on all states, international organizations and UN specialized agencies not to recognize any such altered status; and demanded that Russia immediately and unconditionally reverse its 21 February and 29 September 2022 decisions and withdraw its military forces from Ukraine.
- United Nations General Assembly, General Assembly Resolution ES-11/4: Territorial integrity of Ukraine: defending the principles of the Charter of the United Nations (United Nations) link, Preamble and operative paragraphs 1-5. Source record
Printed from https://independenceatlas.com/movements/donetsk-luhansk/status · last substantive update 24 September 2026.