Entire villages empty out as Ukrainians flee from Russian annexation, refugees say

FILE PHOTO: A view shows the Russian flag flying in the square during a five-day referendum on the secession of Zaporizhzhia region from Ukraine and its joining Russia, in the Russian-controlled city of Melitopol in the Zaporizhzhia region, Ukraine September 26, 2022. REUTERS/Alexander Ermochenko

ZAPORIZHZHIA, Ukraine (Reuters) - "It's funny. Nobody voted, yet the results are in," laughed Lyubomir Boyko, 43, from Golo Pristan, a village in Russian-occupied Kherson province as he waited on Wednesday outside a United Nations aid office with his family at a refugee reception centre.

As Russia prepares to annex a swathe of Ukrainian territory the size of Portugal after staging what it calls referendums in four occupied provinces, Ukrainians who have been able to escape describe an exercise that would be funny if it were not so menacing.