69% of Ukrainians see the goal of the Russian Federation to destroy the Ukrainian nation and statehood – KMIS

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69% of Ukrainians are convinced that Russia seeks either the physical genocide of Ukrainians or the destruction of the Ukrainian nation and statehood, and a total of 83% of respondents believe that the goals of the Russian Federation go beyond Donbas.

Source: survey of the Kyiv International Institute of Sociology (KIIS), conducted on January 9-14, 2026

Details: According to the survey, 69% of respondents believe that Russia either seeks to carry out physical genocide of Ukrainians, or to destroy the Ukrainian nation and statehood. For comparison, in February 2025, 66% of respondents held this opinion.

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Another 11% of respondents are convinced that Russia seeks to seize most of the territory of Ukraine and establish a puppet government, as KMIS notes, 14% said so in the previous survey.

3% believe that Russia wants to “limit itself” to capturing five regions in full – in particular, Donetsk region, Zaporizhzhia, and Kherson region.

Thus, a total of 83% of respondents believe that Russia’s goals go beyond Donbass and are mostly about the complete subjugation or destruction of Ukraine.

At the same time, 2% of respondents believe that Russia seeks to occupy the entire Donbas without control over Zaporizhia and Kherson regions, and 1% – that Moscow wants to limit itself to territories that are currently under occupation.

Another 2% of those polled are of the opinion that Russia allegedly seeks only “denazification” and “demilitarization” of Ukraine without encroaching on its sovereignty.

Reference: The survey was conducted by the method of telephone interviews (CATI) based on a random sample of mobile numbers in all regions of Ukraine under government control. 601 respondents over the age of 18 took part in the study.

The sample did not include residents of territories that are temporarily not controlled by the authorities of Ukraine (at the same time, part of the respondents are IDPs who moved from the occupied territories), and the survey was not conducted with citizens who went abroad after February 24, 2022.

Formally, under normal circumstances, the statistical error of such a sample (with a probability of 0.95 and taking into account the design effect of 1.3) did not exceed 5.3% for indicators close to 50%, 4.6% for indicators close to 25%, 3.2% – for indicators close to 10%, 2.4% – for indicators close to 5%.

KMIS notes that in the conditions of war, systematic deviations are added to the statistical error, but the results remain representative and allow a reliable assessment of public sentiment.