(ANSA-AFP) - MOSCOW, SEP 30 - Russia will annex four occupied regions of Ukraine at a grand ceremony in the Kremlin on Friday, Moscow said, after President Vladimir Putin threatened he could use nuclear weapons to defend the territories. The threats have not deterred a sweeping Ukrainian counter-offensive, which has been pushing back Russian troops in the east and is on the doorstep of the Donetsk region town of Lyman, which Moscow's forces pummelled for weeks before capturing it this summer.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that the annexation of the four areas would be formalised at the ceremony and that Putin would deliver a "major" speech. The Russian leader himself then blamed the war in Ukraine on the West and said simmering conflicts in the former Soviet Union were the result of its collapse. (ANSA-AFP).