DUSHANBE, September 14, 2015, Asia-Plus – The Russian Ruble (RR) has reportedly become the main official currency in the self-declared Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR).

“The Russian Ruble is now the main currency in the DPR,” Denis Pushilin, the head of the Donetsk People’s Council told journalists, according to the Russian news agency Interfax .

The Russian news agency TASS on September 2 cited the DNR Finance Minister Yekaterina Matyushchenko as saying that the share of the Ruble in the budget of the Donetsk Republic currently stood at 92%, and of the Ukrainian Hryvnia, at 8%.

The Russian Ruble has become the main official currency in the Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR), which is another Ukrainian breakaway region, as well.

Polit.ru reports the RR became the main official currency in the LNR on September 1, 2015.

The head of the LNR Council of Ministers Gennady Tsyplakov was cited as saying that  the Ukrainian national currency, the Hryvnia, and the Dollar are used in the region as well, but wages, pensions and social allowances will be paid in the Russian rubles.

We will recall that Russia’s NTV station on August 19 quoted Lugansk Inform Center as saying that the Russian Ruble will become the main official currency in the breakaway LNR.  The announcement was reportedly made by the LNR Council of Ministers.  The LNR leadership stated that incorporation of the Ruble as an official currency in the territory is due to the decreasing volume of the Hryvnia and corresponding stabilization of the fiscal and monetary system.

The Donetsk People’s Republic and the Lugansk People’s Republic are unrecognized entities internationally recognized as the territories of Ukraine.

The flow of Ukrainian currency into Donetsk and Lugansk regions controlled by pro-Russian rebels had decreased, if not completed cut, by the Ukrainian government.  Kyiv formally ceased to pay out pensions and social allowances to the residents of Southeastern Ukraine in the summer of 2014 stating that these territories are not under their control and remain a war zone.

Russia filled the vacuum by supplying Russian Ruble to the territories in the spring of 2015, instituting a multi-currency financial system in the uncontrolled Donetsk and Lugansk.