While the media focuses on the middle part of Putin’s speech, it is worth paying attention to the very beginning of the speech. Here’s what the Russian leader says about the situation.
“Dear friends,” the Russian leader began his speech.
“The topic of my speech is the situation in the Donbas and the progress of a special military operation aimed at liberating it from the neo-Nazi regime that took power in Ukraine in 2014 as a result of an armed coup.” – we hear on the recording.
The Kremlin’s narrative towards its citizens is drawn from these words. Putin does not recognize the legally elected government in Ukraine and treats it as a coup d’état.
The Russian-Ukrainian war is an armed aggression by the Russian Federation against Ukraine that began in February 2014. Initially, Russian operations took the form of a hybrid war, the elements of which were, among others: military intervention in Crimea and its annexation, the war in Donbas and the incident in the Kerch Strait.
From the autumn of 2021, the conflict began to escalate, turning on February 24, 2022 into an open armed conflict of the nature of a regular war, when Russia launched a large-scale invasion of Ukraine.
