RUSSIA: Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday his country would never give in to the West’s attempts to use Ukraine as a tool to destroy Russia.
In a New Year’s video message broadcast on Russian state TV, Putin said Russia was fighting in Ukraine to protect its “motherland” and to secure “true independence” for its people.
In a nine-minute message — the longest New Year’s address of his two-decade rule — Putin accused the West of lying to Russia and of provoking Moscow to launch what it calls a “special military operation” in Ukraine.
“For years, Western elites hypocritically assured us of their peaceful intentions,” he said in a speech filmed in front of Russian service personnel at the headquarters of Russia’s southern military district.
“In fact, in every possible way they were encouraging neo-Nazis who conducted open terrorism against civilians in the Donbas,” Putin said in an uncharacteristically combative New Year’s speech, usually dedicated to well wishes for the year ahead.
Earlier on Saturday, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu had vowed victory in Ukraine was “inevitable” as he praised the heroism of Russian soldiers fighting on the frontlines and those who had died during the 10-month war.
“The West lied about peace,” Putin said. “It was preparing for aggression ... and now they are cynically using Ukraine and its people to weaken and split Russia.
“We have never allowed this, and will never allow anybody to do this to us,” Russian state-run news agencies quoted Putin as saying in the clip, which was broadcast at midnight in Russia’s far east.
Kyiv and the West reject Moscow’s claims over the start of the conflict and say Putin launched a baseless war of aggression in a bid to seize territory and topple Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.
Putin says West is using Ukraine to destroy Russia in New Year video message
https://arab.news/9gwqw
Putin says West is using Ukraine to destroy Russia in New Year video message
- Putin says West is using Ukraine to destroy Russia in New Year video message
Militants kill 6 officers and a civilian in ambushes on police vehicles in northwest Pakistan
- Assailants ambushed a police vehicle and killed one officer in Kohat — when police reinforcements arrived, they launched another attack and killed five more officers and a civilian
- No group claimed responsibility for this week’s attacks, but suspicion may fall on the Pakistani Taliban, also known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or the TTP
PESHAWAR, Pakistan: A pair of attacks on police vehicles by suspected militants killed at least six police officers and a civilian in northwest Pakistan on Tuesday, authorities said.
The assailants ambushed a police vehicle and killed one officer in Kohat, a district in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province. When police reinforcements arrived minutes later, they launched another attack and killed five more officers and a civilian, police official Kamran Khan said.
Separately on Tuesday, a suicide bomber detonated explosives at a police post in Bukkur, a district in eastern Punjab province, killing two officers and wounding four others, police official Shahzad Rafiq said.
He provided no further details and only said officers were still investigating.
No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attacks, which have increased across the country in recent months.
President Asif Ali Zardari condemned the attacks in Kohat and Bukkur and offered condolences to the victims’ families.
The latest violence followed an attack on a paramilitary post in Karak on Monday, when a drone loaded with explosives wounded several officers. The attackers later ambushed two ambulances transporting the wounded, killing three officers and burning their bodies before fleeing. The driver of the second ambulance transported several wounded officers despite suffering burn injuries and authorities recovered the remains of the three officers.
No group claimed responsibility for this week’s attacks, but suspicion may fall on the Pakistani Taliban, also known as Tehrik-e-Taliban Pakistan, or the TTP. The TTP is separate from, but closely allied with, Afghanistan’s Taliban. Islamabad has accused the group of operating from inside Afghanistan, a claim the TTP and Kabul deny.
Pakistan’s military said it killed at least 70 militants on Sunday in strikes along the Afghan border, targeting hideouts of Pakistani militants blamed for recent attacks inside the country.
