The Donetsk People's Republic (DPR; , ) is a disputed republic of Russia with a capital in Donetsk, established on an illegally annexed part of Donetsk Oblast in eastern Ukraine. The DPR was created in 2014 when Russian-backed paramilitaries took control of settlements in the province. This started an eight-year war against Ukraine. The DPR declared itself to be an independent state, but is often described as a puppet state of Russia during the conflict. It was illegally annexed by Russia in 2022.
Following Ukraine's Revolution of Dignity in 2014, Russia occupied and annexed Crimea from Ukraine. In March 2014, pro-Russian, counter-revolutionary protests began in southeastern Ukraine. In the last census, the population of Donetsk Oblast was 57% ethnic Ukrainian and 38% ethnic Russian. Separatist protesters seized government buildings and proclaimed the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR) and Luhansk People's Republic (LPR) as independent states. In April 2014, Russian paramilitaries took control of several towns in the region, starting the war in Donbas, part of the wider Russo-Ukrainian war. Russia covertly supported the separatists with its own troops, tanks and artillery, preventing Ukraine from fully retaking the territory. Russian citizens came to dominate the DPR leadership. In 2018, Ukraine declared the territory to be occupied by Russia. The DPR received no international recognition from any United Nations member state before 2022.
On 21 February 2022, Russia recognised the DPR and LPR as sovereign states. Three days later, it launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, partially under the pretext of defending the republics. Russian forces captured more of Donetsk Oblast, which became part of the DPR. In September 2022, Russia proclaimed the annexation of the DPR and other occupied territories, following referendums widely described as fraudulent. The United Nations General Assembly passed a resolution condemning the "attempted illegal annexation" and demanding that Russian forces withdraw.
The Head of DPR is Denis Pushilin, and its parliament is the People's Council. As a breakaway state, the ideology of the DPR was shaped by Russian imperialist nationalism, Orthodox fundamentalism, and neo-Sovietism. Russian far-right groups played an important role among the separatists, especially at the beginning of the conflict. Organizations such as the UN Human Rights Office and Human Rights Watch have reported human rights abuses in the DPR, including internment, torture, extrajudicial killings, and forced conscription, as well as political and media repression. The DPR People's Militia has also been held responsible for war crimes, among them the shooting down of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17, killing 298 civilians. Ukraine declared the DPR a terrorist organisation.
History Background
The Donetsk People's Republic is in the historical Donbas region of eastern Ukraine. In the last census, the population of Donetsk Oblast was 57% ethnic Ukrainian and 38% ethnic Russian. Meanwhile, 75% of people in Donetsk Oblast had Russian as their mother tongue, although most Ukrainian citizens spoke both Ukrainian and Russian. Since Ukraine's independence from the Soviet Union in 1991, eastern and western Ukraine typically had different voting patterns.
In 2010, Donetsk native Viktor Yanukovych was elected President of Ukraine. Donetsk was the province most strongly supportive of Yanukovych and his Party of Regions. In 2013, Ukraine's parliament approved finalising the European Union–Ukraine Association Agreement. Russia put pressure on Ukraine to reject the agreement and imposed economic sanctions on the country. In November 2013, president Yanukovych suddenly withdrew from signing the agreement, choosing closer ties to Russia instead.
This coerced withdrawal sparked massive protests known as Euromaidan, most of them in western Ukraine and the capital Kyiv. The protests led to the Revolution of Dignity. On 28 January 2014, Ukraine's government resigned. On 18–20 February, more than 100 protesters were killed in clashes with Berkut special riot police in Kyiv; most of them were shot by police snipers. Despite signing an agreement, Yanukovych secretly fled. Ukraine's parliament then voted to remove him and hold new elections. On 27 February, an interim government was established.
There were protests against the revolution in southeastern Ukraine, which were supported by Russia. Leaked e-mails and telephone calls later revealed that the Russian state had funded and organized the protests, mainly through Kremlin advisers Vladislav Surkov and Sergey Glazyev. The region mostly consumed Russia-based media, which promoted the narrative that Ukraine's new government was an illegitimate "fascist junta" and that ethnic Russians were in imminent danger. In April 2014, an armed conflict began between pro-Russian paramilitaries and Ukrainian government forces.Petro, Nicolai N., Understanding the Other Ukraine: Identity and Allegiance in Russophone Ukraine (1 March 2015). Richard Sakwa and Agnieszka Pikulicka-Wilczewska, eds., Ukraine and Russia: People, Politics, Propaganda and Perspectives, Bristol, United Kingdom: E-International Relations Edited Collections, 2015, pp. 19–35. Available at
Donetsk protests
Pro-Russian protesters occupied the Donetsk Regional State Administration Building on 1 March 2014. They declared the unelected Pavel Gubarev as "people's governor" of Donetsk Oblast. Gubarev was a Ukrainian-born pro-Russian activist who opposed the Ukrainian revolution. He was a former member of the neo-Nazi militant group Russian National Unity (RNU) in 1999–2001 and former member of the Nazbol Progressive Socialist Party of Ukraine. On 6 March 2014, the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) removed the protesters.
The first violent death during the Donbas unrest occurred on 13 March 2014. A pro-Ukrainian demonstration in Donetsk was attacked by a larger pro-Russian group. In the fighting, pro-Ukrainian activist Dmytro Cherniavsky was stabbed to death, and 15 others were wounded and hospitalized.
Pavel Gubarev was arrested on charges of separatism and illegal seizure of power. On 16 March, pro-Russian protesters demanding his release forced their way into the Donetsk prosecutor's office and the SBU office, smashing windows and tearing down the Ukrainian flag. Gubarev was later released in a prisoner exchange.
On 6 April 2014, between 1,000 and 2,000 protesters attended a rally in Donetsk calling for a Crimea-style referendum on independence from Ukraine. Hundreds of masked men stormed and seized weapons from the Security Service buildings in the cities of Donetsk and Luhansk. Protesters then stormed and occupied the Donetsk regional government building, breaking down doors and smashing windows. They raised the Russian flag and demanded the regional council call a referendum the next day on joining Russia. Otherwise, they vowed to take control and dismiss the elected government.
As the Donetsk regional parliament did not agree to their demand, on 7 April the unelected separatists gathered inside the RSA building and voted to declare an independent Donetsk People's Republic. According to the Russian ITAR-TASS, the declaration was voted for by some lawmakers, while Ukrainian media said that neither Donetsk City Council nor other district councils delegated any representatives to the session. The separatists announced that a referendum on whether Donetsk Oblast should "join the Russian Federation", would take place "no later than May 11th, 2014." Ukrainian media said that the proposed referendum had no status quo option. The group's leaders appealed to Russian president Vladimir Putin to send Russian peacekeeping forces to the region.
On the morning of 8 April, the 'Patriotic Forces of Donbas', a pro-Kyiv group that was formed on 15 March earlier that year by 13 pro-Kyiv NGOs, political parties and individuals, issued a statement "cancelling" the other group's declaration of independence, citing complaints from locals.
The Donetsk Republic organisation continued to occupy the RSA and upheld all previous calls for a referendum and the release of their leader Pavel Gubarev. On 8 April, about a thousand supporters of the Donetsk Republic rallied in front of the RSA listening to speeches and to Soviet and Russian music. Ukrainian media stated that a number of Russian citizens, including one leader of a far-right militant group, had also taken part in the events.
Beginning of armed conflict
Russia deployed 30,000–40,000 troops near Ukraine's eastern border in early April 2014.
On 12 April 2014, a heavily-armed paramilitary unit crossed the border from Russia and took over Sloviansk and Kramatorsk in Donetsk Oblast. They raided the police and Security Service (SBU) buildings, seizing a large amount of weapons, which were given to local pro-Russian separatists. The unit of more than fifty militants wore no insignia and had been sent from occupied Crimea via Russia. They included Russian Armed Forces volunteers from Russia and Ukraine, commanded by former GRU colonel Igor 'Strelkov' Girkin. He was a right-wing Russian nationalist associated with the neo-imperialist movement and had taken part in the Russian seizure of Crimea. In an interview for Russian ultranationalist newspaper Zavtra, Strelkov said that this action sparked the war in eastern Ukraine:"I'm the one who pulled the trigger of this war. If our unit hadn't crossed the border, everything would have fizzled out, like in Kharkiv or Odesa".
The first conflict deaths in the Donbas occurred on 13 April, when the Russian paramilitaries fired on Ukrainian SBU officers outside Sloviansk. Ukrainian officer Gennady Bilichenko was killed and several wounded, while at least one Russian militant was killed.
In response, on 15 April, the interim Ukrainian government launched an "Anti-Terrorist Operation" (ATO) in the Donbas. This marked the beginning of an eighty-four day siege of Sloviansk. However, Ukrainian forces were poorly prepared, and the operation soon stalled. Russian separatist commander Strelkov said that Ukrainian forces were "extremely cautious" at first, as they did not know how Russia would react.
On 17 April 2014, an agreement was signed in Geneva by representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the EU and the US. It called for a ceasefire in the Donbas, for all illegal armed groups to disarm, and for all illegally occupied buildings and public places to be vacated. However, leaders of the Donetsk People's Republic ignored the agreement and vowed to continue their occupations until a referendum was accepted or the government in Kyiv resigned.
The Donetsk Russian separatists carried out their first civilian killings in the Donbas on 17 April. They kidnapped local councillor Volodymyr Rybak after he tried to re-raise the Ukrainian flag in Horlivka. His body was dumped in a river along with those of Maidan activists Yuri Popravko and Yuri Diakovskyi – all had been tortured and mutilated. Russian paramilitaries kidnapped more than two dozen people in the first month of the war, including eight OSCE observers and journalists such as Simon Ostrovsky.
The OSCE reported that all the main institutions of Donetsk city observed by the Monitoring Mission seemed to be working normally as of 16 April. On 22 April, separatists agreed to release the session hall of the building along with two floors to state officials. The ninth and tenth floors were later released on 24 April. On the second day of the Republic, organisers decided to pour all of their alcohol out and announce a prohibition law after issues arose due to excessive drinking in the building.
Ukrainian authorities released separatist leader Pavel Gubarev and two others in exchange for three people detained by the Donetsk Republic.
Public opinion polls