Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that what was happening in Ukraine was a tragedy but that Russia had no choice than to launch a special military operation, Russian news agencies reported.
In other development, TASS News Agency reported an exposition of countries put together, which have joined Ukraine in fighting Russia saying the West needs to honestly and openly state that it wants to open humanitarian corridors in Ukraine to rescue militants, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said.
“If there is a desire to save precisely these militants, then, probably, the West should honestly and openly say whom they placed their bets on and not hide, as usual, behind the issues of humanity, talk about humanitarian issues in the interests of civilians. We see whose side they are on,” she told the Russia-24 TV channel on Tuesday.
In her opinion, if the West indeed wants to open humanitarian corridors in Ukraine not for the civilians, then it should be called “the rescue of those they trained.”
“If now the collective West, individually, as envoys, wants to get involved in shielding neo-Nazis then it should be called not the opening of humanitarian corridors tied to the civilian population but the rescue of those they trained,” the diplomat said.
That said, according to the spokeswoman, the Russian side did provide humanitarian corridors “yet the armed forces on the Ukrainian side were not letting [the civilians] use these humanitarian corridors.”
“Russia repeatedly raised the issue that the Ukrainian militants that are commanded by the Kiev regime or do not obey it at all are acting in some space of their own, not letting the people use those humanitarian corridors that were opened by the Russian side,” the diplomat noted.
