Russian President Vladimir Putin has signed treaties to annex parts of Ukraine into Russia, defying Western powers. In a ceremony in the Kremlin’s opulent white-and-gold St. George’s Hall, Putin and the Russian-installed leaders in the four regions of Ukraine put their names on treaties for them to join Russia, in a sharp escalation of the seven-month conflict. The signing ceremony comes three days after the completion of Kremlin-orchestrated “referendums” on joining Russia that were dismissed by Kyiv and the West as a “sham.” The separatist Donetsk and Luhansk regions in eastern Ukraine have …