MOSCOW, May 31. /TASS/. Large-scale reconstruction efforts are underway in the Lugansk and Donetsk People’s Republics, a member of the Russian lower house of parliament told TASS on Tuesday.
Construction workers are arriving in Donbass en masse, said Viktor Vodolatsky, First Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Issues of the Commonwealth of Independent States and Contacts with Fellow Countrymen. "They are rebuilding bridges, <…> roads, drafting budgets to restore schools, kindergartens, and hospitals, destroyed by neo-Nazis, who in the first place targeted social infrastructure facilities. Thousands of builders are already working in the LPR and DPR," he said.
Russian regions have been taking Donbass areas under their patronage, sending people to rebuild them, according to Vodolatsky.
On February 24, Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a special military operation in response to a request for help by the heads of the Donbass republics. He stressed that Moscow had no plans of occupying Ukrainian territories, but aimed to demilitarize and denazify the country.