Russian President Vladimir Putin predicted this Friday the failure of a Ukrainian counter-offensive against Russian forces in Ukraine.
“The Ukrainian armed forces have no chance either in this or in other areas,” Putin said at the St. Petersburg International Economic Seminar (SPIEF).
Putin said that the Ukrainian forces “used the so-called strategic reserves to break through the defense.” [russas]strengthen your own defenses and move forward.
“None of these goals have been achieved,” Putin said, quoted by the French news agency AFP.
Putin confirmed that Ukraine had suffered “very heavy losses” in the recent counter-offensive.
He also considered that Ukraine would not be able to fight “for a long time” due to the lack of military equipment, despite Western supplies.
Moscow insists that the current Ukrainian offensive has failed, while Kyiv says it has liberated several cities and about 100 square kilometers, mostly on the southern front.
According to AFP, Western military analysts say Kyiv has yet to throw the bulk of its forces into a counteroffensive.
At SPIEF, Putin called his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky “a disgrace to the Jewish people” and again accused Kyiv of being in the hands of neo-Nazis to justify the February 24, 2022 invasion.
“I have many Jewish friends since childhood. And they say that Zelensky is not a Jew, but a disgrace to the Jewish people. This is not a joke,” said Putin, whose long speech was broadcast live on Russian television.
Putin once again accused Zelensky of covering up for “neo-Nazi bastards” and treating Nazi collaborators in World War II like heroes.
“Why aren’t they listening to us? We have to fight it,” he said.
“We have every right to consider the task of denazification of Ukraine one of the main ones,” he added.
In announcing the invasion, Putin said Moscow intended to “demilitarize and denazify” Ukraine, which broke away from Russia with the collapse of the former Soviet Union in 1991.
Putin also blamed the Kiev regime for the alleged genocide of the Russian-speaking population of Ukraine, especially in the Donbass, a region formed by the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics.
The Russian leader recognized the independence of the two Ukrainian territories ahead of the military invasion, which he also justified by asking for help from separatist forces in Donbas.
Last September, Russia annexed Donetsk and Luhansk, as well as Kherson and Zaporozhye, after doing the same with Crimea in 2014, when a Moscow-backed separatist war broke out in Donbass.
Kyiv and the wider international community do not recognize Russian sovereignty in the five regions annexed to Ukraine.
SPIEF, which is considered the Russian counterpoint to the Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, will run until Saturday.
Dedicated to the theme “Sovereign development is the basis of a just world. Let’s unite efforts for the benefit of future generations” with the participation of representatives of 15 countries, the official TASS agency reports.
The list of guests includes President of Algeria Abdelmajid Tebboun, who is on a state visit to Russia.
Author: Portuguese
Source: CM Jornal
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