Vladimir Putin has defended his invasion of Ukraine in a rare public speech, calling it “the right decision” and saying Russia would achieve its “noble” aims.
Speaking alongside Belarusian leader Aleksandr Lukashenko in Russia’s far east, Mr. Putin claimed that a conflict with Ukraine had become inevitable and that he had been left with no alternative but to launch the invasion to protect the Russian-speaking Donbas region.
Mr. Putin ordered what he called a “special military operation” on 24 February with the aim of “demilitarising and de-nazifying Ukraine”.
On Tuesday, the Russian president said that the invasion was necessary because the US was using Ukraine to threaten Russia, including via the Nato military alliance. Mr. Putin also claimed he had to protect Russian-speaking people in eastern Ukraine from persecution.
“On the one hand, we are helping and saving people, and on the other, we are simply taking measures to ensure the security of Russia itself,” Mr. Putin said, adding that the conflict was inevitable and essential to defend Russia in the long term.
“Its goals are absolutely clear and noble,” the Russian president said. “It’s clear that we didn’t have a choice. It was the right decision.”
Dismissing the punitive sanctions imposed by the US and its allies following his invasion of Ukraine, he said Russia would never again depend on the west.
Mr Putin, who had been a constant presence on Russian television at the start of the war, had largely retreated from public view since Moscow pulled its forces out of northern Ukraine earlier this month.
“The sanctions were total, the isolation was complete but the Soviet Union was still first in space,” Mr. Putin said, according to Russian state television. “We don’t intend to be isolated. It is impossible to severely isolate anyone in the modern world – especially such a vast country as Russia.”
Mr. Putin was there to mark Russia’s annual Cosmonautics Day, commemorating the first manned space flight that blasted off in 1961 by Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin.
The president went on to praise Russian forces participating in the Ukraine invasion for their “courage”.
“We know that today our officers are participating in a special military operation in Ukraine’s Donbas [region], providing assistance to the people’s republics of Donbas. They act courageously, competently, and effectively, using the most advanced weapons fitted with unique specifications”, Mr. Putin said.
Later on Tuesday, Mr. Putin said Ukraine had deviated from the agreements made at a peace conference in Istanbul, and that talks are in a “dead end”, the Interfax news agency reported.
Russia’s president also said that images and footage of dead bodies strewn across the Ukrainian town of Bucha were fake, while Mr. Lukashensko made a bizarre and baseless claim that the deaths there were the result of a special operation “carried out by the British”.
Moscow’s vow to not let up in its onslaught came as besieged the Ukrainian city of Mariupol provided an update on the death and destruction wrought by six weeks of bombardment by Russian troops. The mayor of the city said more than 10,000 civilians have died and their corpses “carpeted through the streets”.
Mr. Putin’s reference to the operation in Donbas comes as Russia amasses forces in the eastern region of Ukraine, with reports indicating that new battalions and military columns are being deployed there.
Western officials said they are expecting Russia to double its reinforcement of troops in the region and satellite images have also suggested the build-up of Russian weaponry is ongoing.
Ukrainian officials urged civilians to flee eastern areas ahead of the anticipated offensive, while the battle for the southern port city of Mariupol was reaching a decisive phase.
Should the Russians seize the city’s Azovstal district, they would be in full control of Mariupol, the lynchpin between Russian-held areas to the west and east.
Ukraine’s president Volodymy Zelenskiy overnight called for more weapons from the west to help it end the siege of Mariupol and fend off the expected eastern offensive.
“Unfortunately we are not getting as much as we need to end this war faster … in particular, to lift the blockade of Mariupol,” he said.
Mariupol’s Azov regiment claimed that Russia used chemical weapons in the southern city. It reportedly said that soldiers were left dizzy and unable to breathe after a “poisonous substance of unknown origin” was dropped on them from a Russian drone.
Ukrainian deputy defence minister Hanna Malyar said the government was looking into the claim and that “there is a theory that these could be phosphorous munitions”.
Though these reports are yet to be confirmed, the British government said “all possible options” are on the table if Mr. Putin’s forces are found to have used chemical weapons.
Meanwhile, reports of sexual violence in Ukraine are on the rise, according to a senior UN official, while a human rights group has accused Russian soldiers of using rape as a weapon of war.
The head of UN Women, Sima Bahous, told the UN security council on Monday night that “we are increasingly hearing of rape and sexual violence”.
“The brutality displayed against Ukrainian civilians has raised all red flags,” Ms. Bahous said, demanding the allegations to be investigated.
