by Alison Ryan

The truth of NATO provocation against Russia still needs to be stated amidst the plethora of USA and UK and European propaganda.

Putin promised to finish what he called the “special military operation” to seize territory from Ukraine, which Moscow considers historically to be Russian. He blamed NATO nations and their allies for instigating the battle currently under way in Ukraine.

“The countries that have historically tried to contain Russia don’t need a self-sufficient, massive country such as ours. They think it is dangerous to them just by means of its existence. But that is far from the truth. They are the ones threatening the whole world,” said Putin. He said, “By launching the offensive in Ukraine, Russian forces neutralised “a real danger of … a major conflict that would have unfolded on our territory according to other people’s scripts”.

In Moscow, Putin and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres met to discuss the situation at the Azovstal steel plant, where the last Ukrainian defenders of Mariupol (NATO troops included) are holed up after months of Russian siege and relentless bombardment. President Putin has called what’s unfolding in Mariupol a difficult and tragic situation. Putin said to UN chief: ‘You’ve been misled’ about Mariupol’s situation. Putin has agreed “in principle” to UN and International Committee for the Red Cross (ICRC) involvement in the evacuation of civilians from a besieged steel plant in Ukraine’s southern city of Mariupol, according to the UN.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4FFBpajMxU&t=16s

Meanwhile Russia has imposed personal restrictions on 287 British members of parliament and banned them from entering the country, accusing them of fuelling “unwarranted Russophobic hysteria”, the country’s foreign ministry has announced.

Also, Moscow says it is expelling eight Japanese diplomats in a tit-for-tat response to expulsions by Tokyo. Russia’s foreign ministry accused Japan of pursuing an “openly hostile anti-Russian course” and said the country’s envoys must depart by May 10. It accused Tokyo of “taking steps that were unprecedented in modern Russian-Japanese relations” and “abandoning friendly, constructive relations with Russia”. Earlier this month, Japan expelled eight Russian diplomats and announced it will end imports of Russian coal.

Russia is investigating the “installation of explosive devices by neo-Nazis in Mykolaiv,” state news agency TASS has reported, citing a Telegram post of The Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation. “According to the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation, in Nikolaev [Mykolaiv], near an aircraft repair plant, neo-Nazis have installed radio-controlled explosive devices with damaging elements that they plan to detonate in a mass gathering of people and blame the Russian military for this,” the report said.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/4/26/russia-warns-poland-bulgaria-it-will-cut-off-gas-supplies-liveblog