Washington: The Russian military has begun a brutal assault on the people of Ukraine without provocation, without justification, without necessity and it is a premeditated attack, said US President Joe Biden.
“Vladimir Putin has been planning this for months, as I’ve been — as we’ve been saying all along. He moved more than 175,000 troops, military equipment into positions along the Ukrainian border, ” he said addressing the media.
He moved blood supplies into position and built a field hospital, which tells you all you need to know about his intentions all along.
He rejected every good-faith effort the United States and our Allies and partners made to address our mutual security concerns through dialogue to avoid needless conflict and avert human suffering.
For weeks — for weeks, we have been warning that this would happen. And now it’s unfolding largely as we predicted.
In the past week, we’ve seen shelling increase in the Donbas, the region in eastern Ukraine controlled by Russian-backed separatists. The Russian government has perpetrated cyberattacks against Ukraine, said Biden.
“We saw a staged political theater in Moscow — outlandish and baseless claims that Ukraine was — Ukraine was about to invade and launch a war against Russia, that Ukraine was prepared to use chemical weapons, that Ukraine committed a genocide — without any evidence, ” he said.
People saw a flagrant violation of international law in attempting to unilaterally create two new so-called republics on sovereign Ukrainian territory and at the very moment that the United Nations Security Council was meeting to stand up for Ukraine’s sovereignty to stave off invasion, Putin declared his war.
Within moments — moments, missile strikes began to fall on historic cities across Ukraine. Then came in the air raids, followed by tanks and troops rolling in.
“Putin is the aggressor. Putin chose this war. And now he and his country will bear the consequences. This is going to impose severe costs on the Russian economy, both immediately and over time.Twenty-seven members of the European Union, including France, Germany, Italy — as well as the United Kingdom, Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand, and many others — to amplify the joint impact of our response, ” US President said.