Ukraine's President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Thursday that Russia's issuance of its passports to residents of eastern Ukraine is the first step towards the "annexation" of the region.
"This is definitely the first step, because the same thing happened once in Crimea, Crimea residents were given Russian passports. This is a big problem," Zelenskiy told a news conference.
(Reporting by Pavel Polityuk and Natalia Zinest; Editing by Alison Williams)
