This was said on Tuesday by the Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in an interview with India Today.
The minister recalled that in November last year, Russian President Vladimir Putin invited the United States and NATO to sit at the negotiating table and discuss legal security guarantees without further NATO expansion eastward, but they refused.
«At that time, the Ukrainian army significantly increased the shelling of these republics in violation of all ceasefire regimes. We had no choice but to recognize them, sign a mutual aid agreement in response to their request, and send our armed forces as part of a military operation aimed at protection of their lives, ”said Lavrov.
On February 21, Putin announced the recognition of the sovereignty of the DNR and the LPR. Russia recognized the republics in accordance with their constitutions within the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts in early 2014. On February 24, the President of the Russian Federation, in response to the request of the leaders of the Donbass republics for help, announced a special military operation in Ukraine aimed at denazising and demilitarizing the country. The DPR and LPR have launched an operation to liberate their territories under Kiev control, reports TASS.
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