RUSSIAN tanks are on the move after Putin reportedly ordered troops into Ukraine and recruited medics to prepare for “bloodshed”.
Videos obtained by Al-Jazeera show Russian military vehicles in two breakaway areas of eastern Ukraine that Putin recognised as independent states last night – effectively annexing them into Russia.
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Boris Johnson is chairing an emergency Cobra meeting this morning after the Russian president ordered his long-feared invasion under the guise of peace-keeping.
The PM has already spoken to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to pledge Britain’s steadfast support in the face of Russia’s aggression.
He will address Parliament later today, it’s been confirmed.
The world is now holding its breath after footage of Terminator-style Russian forces was taken from Makiivka, in the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), and the neighbouring Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR).
Celebratory fireworks were fired and Russian flags were waved following Putin’s announcement recognising both last night.
The rest of Ukraine is now braced for a massive attack from the north, south and east “at any moment” after Putin declared the besieged nation was “part of Russia.”
It emerged today that Moscow is urgently seeking medics to go to work in makeshift hospitals in Rostov, close to the republics.
A doctor said: “Today we have been offered to go work at a temporary hospital in Rostov.
News from overnight:
- President Vladimir Putin launched an effective invasion of eastern Ukraine
- He ordered tanks across the border into the newly-recognised Donetsk and Luhansk regions
- He’s claimed his tanks are carrying out “peacekeeping functions”
- But the actions could trigger a full-scale war
- The US, UK and EU have vowed to hit Russia with sanctions today
- Boris Johnson is holding a dawn Cobra meeting to discuss the UK’s response
“This is how they said it: ‘The salary will be high, your patients will be the wounded’.”
Another medic said there is an urgent plea for doctors and nurses “with experience working in conflict zones”.
Putin said in a rambling televised address last night: “We demand that those who have seized and are retaining power in Kyiv immediately halt all hostilities.
“Otherwise, the Ukrainian ruling regime will be wholly and entirely responsible for the possible continuation of the bloodshed.”
An eyewitnesses spotted huge columns of troops moving through Donetsk in the direction of Yasinuvata even before he finished his hawkish and bellicose rant.
The sources later clarified that the witnesses could not be certain that the troops seen were Russian.
But Yasinuvata is just nine miles from the 250-mile First World War-style “contact line” of trenches which has separated Ukrainian and pro-Russian separatists for the past eight years.
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The president has signed off orders to parliament which made Russia the first country in the world to recognise the two mini-states created when he orchestrated a land grab in 2014.
The last paragraph of his orders to parliament said he was ordering Russian armed forces to “provide peacekeeping on the territory of Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republic”.
In a further alarming development, Russia’s parliament was also said to be adopting plans to build military bases in self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk – and stay for 10 years.
The US has ordered its embassy staff to leave Ukraine immediately in the wake of the revelations. Officials from America said warnings had been sent to Russian political opponents on a Kremlin “kill or capture” list.
And Ukrainian citizens say they’ll take up arms and “fight to the death” to defend their country.
Meanwhile, there was intrigue over how a leading Putin-backing ultranationalist politician had on December 27 predicted the timing of the military move into Ukraine – almost to the hour.
His words suggested a clear plan by the Russian authorities which has been unfolding since the end of last year.
‘BLOODSHED’
Firebrand Vladimir Zhirinovsky – currently in hospital recovering from Covid – told parliament that a military campaign would start at 4am on 22 February.
In fact the first military vehicles were seen a few hours earlier, in darkness, late on February 21.
The leader of the Liberal Democratic Party had told MPs: “You will feel it at 4am on February 22.”
Putin’s prime minister Mikhail Mishustin also admitted that he had been working for “many months” assessing how to stop economic damage from Western sanctions from recognition of the two Ukrainian regions.
“We have been preparing for many months for the potential reaction over the recognition of LNR and DPR,” he told an emergency Russian national security council session when Putin ordered his key allies to personally back the move.
In December, Zhirinovsky told MPs over the move on Ukraine: “I wish 2022 would be a peaceful year, but I love the truth.
“I’ve been telling the truth for 72 years.
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“This will not be a peaceful year. This will be the year when Russia will finally become a great country again, and everyone has to shut up, and respect our country.
“Otherwise they will shut us up, and destroy Russians first in Donbas, and next in the west of Russia.
“So let’s support the new direction in Russia’s foreign policy.”
Source: Sun
