The decision to conduct a special operation on the territory of Ukraine was made based on security considerations of the Russian Federation, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said on August 20 at the plenary session of the First International Anti-Fascist Congress.
"For eight years, the Kiev regime has committed egregious crimes against the citizens of the DPR and LPR. Thousands of innocent people, including children, were killed. At the same time, the military development of the Ukrainian territory by the North Atlantic Alliance began. Kiev has set a course for joining NATO. All this has created unacceptable threats to Russia's security," the minister said.
Shoigu added that conducting a special military operation was the only right decision.
He also added that in the early days, the AFU forces used completely inhumane tactics, hiding among residential quarters of Ukrainian cities and hiding behind civilians as a human shield.
"Being defeated on the "ground" and retreating, they purposefully destroy everything around, so that nothing remains for civilians. The same tactics were followed by the German Nazis during the Great Patriotic War," the head of the Ministry of Defense said.
The head of the defense department said that this is partly due to the composition of the Ukrainian army. According to the minister, after 2014, "national battalions appeared in the country, professing the idea of neo-Nazism, racial intolerance towards everyone they consider not Ukrainians."
Also, during the plenary session of the First International Anti-Fascist Congress, Shoigu said that many residents of Ukraine did not accept Kiev's policy aimed at banning everything related to Russia. He noted that after the collapse of the USSR, Washington did everything to create an antipode of the Russian Federation from Ukraine. According to him, the promotion of legislation in the country that prohibits the Russian language, media, and culture was encouraged.
In addition, Shoigu pointed out that the strike of Ukrainian troops on the pre-trial detention center in Yelenovka in the Donetsk People's Republic (DPR), where the captured fighters of the nationalist formation "Azov" (a terrorist organization banned in the Russian Federation) were, is an attempt by Kiev to hide the truth about the crimes of militants.
Shoigu stressed that radical nationalism, which was planted by the Azov battalion, became the ideology of the entire Bandera Ukraine. According to him, today the Russian military find a large amount of extremist literature in abandoned positions of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU).
An artillery strike on the pre-trial detention center in Yelenovka was carried out on July 29. 50 Ukrainians were killed and another 193 were injured. Also, eight more employees of the detention center received injuries of varying severity.
The Investigative Committee of Russia (IC RF) announced on August 5 that it was investigating the circumstances of the shelling. It was noted that the actions of the Kiev security forces were planned in advance. This is evidenced by factors such as the accuracy and accuracy of missile hits.
Kiev pursued the goal of destroying witnesses of crimes committed against civilians, the ministry added.
As the Deputy Minister of Defense of the Russian Federation, Colonel-General Alexander Fomin, said on August 3, the AFU struck the pre-trial detention center in Yelenovka immediately after the captured militants of the Azov regiment began to testify. He explained that the Ukrainian military were afraid that the prisoners would tell the truth about the crimes of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. On August 10, the Prosecutor General's Office of the DPR qualified the shelling of the pre-trial detention center in Yelenovka by Ukrainian troops as a terrorist act.
Russia continues the special operation to protect Donbass, which Russian President Vladimir Putin announced on February 24. A few days earlier, the situation in the region had significantly worsened due to shelling by the Ukrainian military. The authorities of the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics announced the evacuation of residents to the Russian Federation, and also appealed to Moscow for help. On February 21, Putin signed a decree recognizing the independence of the DPR and the LPR.
Watch more relevant videos and details about the situation in Donbass on the Izvestia TV channel.
