Russian President Vladimir Putin has launched a special military operation and pledged to oversee a “demilitarization and de-Nazification” of Ukraine.
He also gave a chilling warning to Ukraine’s allies in the West during an early Thursday morning address in Moscow.
‘To anyone who would consider interfering from the outside – if you do, you will face consequences greater than any you have faced in history,’ he said on a television broadcast around 6am Moscow time.
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Putin said he could no longer tolerate what he called threats from Ukraine.
Following the end of his short speech explosions were reported in Kiev, Odessa, Ukraine’s third-largest city, as well as the city of Kramatorsk in the eastern Donetsk region.
The Mail Online reports: The United Nations Security Council had just convened an emergency meeting Wednesday night when Putin took to Russian airwaves to announce the invasion at 5:50am Moscow time.
Antonio Guterres, the Secretary General of the United Nations, had urged Putin to stop his tanks.
‘If indeed an operation is being prepared, I have only one thing to say from the bottom of my heart,’ said Guterres.
‘President Putin, stop your troops from attacking Ukraine. Give peace a chance. Too many people have already died.’
Putin ignored the plea, going on TV to describe the invasion as a ‘special military occupation’ and said he wants to ‘demilitarize’ and ‘de-Nazify’, not occupy, the country.
He told Ukrainian service members to ‘lay down their arms and go home,’ saying Russia could not exist with a ‘constant threat emanating from the territory of Ukraine’ and clashes between Russian and Ukrainian solders was ‘inevitable.’
