Russian President Vladimir Putin has backed the merge of three Northern territories into an enlarged Krasnoyarsk region by signing a decree on assistance in the fields of energy, infrastructure and other projects to the region, the Itar-Tass news agency reported on Tuesday.

"We are ready to back these plans," Putin declared, speaking ata conference attended by regional heads of the Krasnoyarsk region, Evenkia and Taimyr, whose population will decide on the unification in a referendum scheduled for April 17, according to the report.

Putin said that he signed a decree on assistance to the process of the unification of the territories, their power grids, infrastructure and other big projects.

However, the president warned that the goal of the unification is to improve the life of the people of these territories.

"Plans of that kind are not merely aimed at satisfying someone's administrative aspirations, but should aim at the improvement of the life of the people, otherwise, such plans would be pointless," Putin noted.

He also said that the unification should not have adverse effects on the culture of smaller ethnic groups living in the three regions, and should "mainly in constituent territories of the federation that cannot independently solve many of their social problems, though they exist as a separate (federation) units due to objective circumstances."

Source: Xinhua