abc news special report now reporting david muir good afternoon we're coming on the air at this hour with new developments involving russia and ukraine we have been monitoring vladimir putin speaking to the russian people and just moments ago putin addressing the russian people saying he reveals that he intends to recognize two russian-controlled separatist regions in eastern ukraine to recognize their independence that was expected it was a move leaders in the west had been most concerned about that could possibly spark a much larger conflict putin just before his remarks to the russian people had already informed france and germany of his decision doing so would be in fact a major escalation and now he has done that likely forcing the u.s and allies to impose severe sanctions they said would be coming if russia moved to recognize their independence putin's saying moments ago i deem it necessary to immediately recognize the independence of doneks and luhansk these are two regions of the donbass region where russian separatists have been living they have been in conflict with ukraine for some time vladimir putin saying he will now recognize them as independent drafting a document and signing it he said almost immediately he did tell the russian people that he then expected sanctions from the west almost immediately saying they will likely come this move is a violation of international law the russian military could now react by moving in those 150 000 troops that have been surrounding ukraine president putin could use this as a pretext to then help the russian separatists again within this region the don bass region there in eastern ukraine that he's now said he will declare as independent two separate areas within the donbass region he says are and will be independent uh we do know that again tens of thousands of russian troops amassed on that border the question now is whether or not vladimir putin will send any of those troops in uh to help secure this independence he had a warning for ukraine to end hostilities and as the west uh had said he would likely do he began to describe the situation in ukraine uh the other way around saying essentially that the hostilities are caused by the ukrainians that there are women children and elderly suffering at the hands of the ukrainians in eastern ukraine there where russian separatists of course have been living and controlling their own regions for some time though not acknowledged by the russians as independent i want to bring in our senior foreign correspondent ian panel and i know this can be somewhat confusing for people who have been watching this conflict watching the west predict and prepare the world for what they believe could be coming but ian this was precisely what the bide administration was most concerned about that he would recognize uh two key parts of the donbass region in eastern ukraine as independent now from ukraine yeah david i think this is the most dangerous moment in this crisis and there are still many questions unanswered are we actually just seeing the end of the beginning of this crisis in other words has vladimir putin just laid out a smaller ambition just to officially recognize the independence of the donyesk and luhansk people's republic these two tiny small areas in the far east of ukraine that are part of the bigger dom bas industrial region the rebels the russian supported kremlin-bat rebels essentially control 30 of the donbass and the ukrainian government controls 70 now what follows on from this recognition of independence is it just that russia will support them in their own governance that things will calm down i think the greater fear here the very real fear is that is not what vladimir putin said today we were treated to this long rambling revisionist history of the history of ukraine essentially saying that it was a soviet creation but i think in innate in all of that was this underlying thought by vladimir putin which we've heard expressed before he doesn't really recognize ukraine as a sovereign independent strong country that should be treated as such he sees it as an artificial creation and that it's harming russia's interests so if this declaration if this recognition of independence then leads to greater military action to the rolling in of russian tanks to an extension of the territory that i think the larger fears of the biden administration are really going to come to pass if all that happens is you have this legislative process where you say yes we recognize your independence but nothing else follows which i don't think is going to happen then perhaps we can breathe a little but but i don't think that's what we're looking at i think we're looking at the start of a much more serious uh much more serious collision of events ian you talked about vladimir putin in addressing the russian people not holding anything back there in fact he talked about ukraine uh wanting to become potentially a nuclear power again saying they would want a nuclear weapon he suggested that the west would help them with that he talked about uh nato growing uh that that was not a promise kept by the west over many many years along the russian border there uh and ian i want to drill down on this point though the main question at this point is not whether or not vladimir putin is going to officially acknowledge what he says is the independence of these two distinct areas of the donbass region in eastern ukraine the question is whether or not he then believes it will be necessary to send in russian military to help secure that independence yeah you're absolutely right i mean that is a question that i think we've all got to be really focused on what does it lead to do you then see the leaders of these two little stateless if you like then appeal to russia who's recognized as independent and say look we're under attack by the ukrainians and that's the narrative that they've been portraying over the last four or five days that we're under sustained attack that they're committing genocide they've used this word genocide against the russian-speaking population there the women children and the elderly have to flee the country we've seen a series of these bogus uh so-called false flag operations to justify uh the building up of of armaments and support in the area if they then appeal to russia and russia responds militarily the question is what does the ukrainian military do does it just stand by and allow russia to take over part of its territory does it stand and fight and if it does then that's when we're really in dangerous territory because you have all those other russian troops massed to the north in belarus to the south in crimea if they start to roll across the border then the worst case scenario which is what the biden administration has been telling us all will happen will come to pass and all of this has centered on what was vladimir putin really asking for here did he just want these security guarantees that ukraine was never going to join nato was this really about restoring the might of russia restoring the russian empire not recognizing ukraine as a valid country and i'm afraid a lot of what we heard in this rambling speech tonight echoes those kinds of fears and if that is the case i'm afraid we're entering a dark period and we should point out uh ian panel thank you for outlining what we could be witnessing uh here uh along the ukraine russian border could be witnessing of course we don't know the next move from vladimir putin other than the fact that he has just declared before the russian people that he will declare much of the donbass region those two regions in particular that are included uh as independent from ukraine he said if we then have to act i am sure the russian people will support the efforts i want to go to our chief white house correspondent cecilia vega because the biden administration cecilia has been very clear on this i know we're awaiting word whether or not they will impose severe sanctions immediately whether they're going to continue to observe what happens next in the meantime you and i were talking before we came on the air that the state department outlined this very scenario in recent days and what this would constitute if this was in fact the action that vladimir putin takes yeah and david this is really important because uh european allies had explicitly warned vladimir putin to not go through with exactly what he is announcing that he is going to go through with with right now and the state department uh the administration the bide administration did as well just a number of days ago uh secretary of state anthony lincoln had said that this would be a gross violation of international law he said it would necessitate a swift and firm response from the united states in full coordination uh with all of our allies and partners so while the ball is in vladimir putin's court for what happens next in terms of whether he decides to go for what ian was just saying a full-scale invasion as the united states and the white house here have been predicting right now in these these next immediate minutes if not hours the ball is in the court of western allies and the white house to see how far they go with this package of sanctions they have been deliberately vague leading up to this and not telling us what sanctions would entail just that you have heard president biden use this phrase swift and severe sanctions we know that it will be a massive package of sanctions we know that the vice president over the weekend when she was at that security conference in munich said that these would be some of the greatest sanctions if not the strongest that we have ever issued and we also know david that amer that allies western allies are united on this front that they are all threatening swift and severe sanctions i think the question right now in terms of what these sanctions will look like is whether the administration and the allies decide to sort of scale this back just based on what putin announced today they had threatened these sanctions based on a full-scale invasion that they had been warning of but in terms of what these sanctions potentially could look like uh we're talking about aborts johnson uh prime minister of the uk just said the other day that we could be talking about preventing russian companies from trading in british pounds and american dollars if putin decides to invade we're looking at everything from blocking russia's access to technology electronics supplies things like cell phone parts which would be a huge blow to the russian people cutting russia off from the international banking system even potentially targeting vladimir putin himself so as we wait to see when and if the united states decides to go forward with these sanctions and what that looked like david i'll just give you a quick update because this really has been an extraordinary last few days here at this white house with this change in tone the president was supposed to be in delaware last night and today he canceled that trip he just not long ago here at the white house he's inside right now behind me wrapped up a meeting with some of the highest levels of this administration his vice president this was the national security council meeting the secretary of state was here as i said the vice president secretary of defense and and you know this david you talked about this this big question of whether president biden and vladimir putin will sit down with a face-to-face meeting as had been floated after uh french president macron's call with putin yesterday the white house announcing that perhaps there could be this meeting but i will tell you i'm being told by sources that this is a theoretical meeting david that it would only happen if an invasion does not take place and right now all the sources that i am talking to here at the white house still firmly believe that we are in this window for an invasion and certainly what we just heard from vladimir putin right now david ratchets up this tension there has been these incremental steps toward glimmers of hope and diplomacy but you heard uh jake sullivan the national security adviser say today an ominous warning that hour by hour the hope for diplomacy is diminishing giving the behavior that we are seeing from russia right now david and you have to wonder if vladimir putin's announcement just moments ago before the russian people that he will declare those two regions the donetsk region and the lugansk region both within the donbass as a fully independent whether or not that's a walking up to the line or has he crossed the line the question is will the sanctions kick in now as cecilia so definitely pointed out there or whether or not they will continue to wait there you see vladimir putin signing what we gather is you know the documentation that backs up what he's now declared before the russian people in doing so he warned the ukrainians that hostilities must end in the donbass region or he warned that perhaps russia would then have to take steps he also said that if we do i gather i will have the full support of the russian people you heard cecilia mention the prime minister of the uk boris johnson he in fact held a press conference at downing street as this was unfolding just moments ago he said this move by vladimir putin is plainly in breach of international law flagrant violation of the sovereignty the integrity of ukraine he took it a step further even he said i think it's a very ill omen and a very dark sign that things are headed in the wrong direction uh our foreign correspondent james longman is in moscow he of course was monitoring what vladimir putin was telling the russian people and james you've also been watching what we've been reporting here which uh have been the images that the russian people have been watching now for several days now the west uh the us in particular had warned of a false flag operation or several of them to build this narrative that the uh eastern portion of ukraine had become very dangerous for these russian separatists uh it brought thousands told thousands that they should evacuate and come into russia uh and and now he has told the russian people that uh ukraine wants a nuclear weapon that the west is helping them that uh they did not keep their promises over many many years as far as nato expansion was concerned this was vladimir putin basically telling the russian people all of the things that he thinks the west has not kept their promises on and the question now is whether or not this is the beginning as ian pointed out uh of something much larger here yeah i think we really did see putin unchained and i think it's really important for people at home to realize that this the way that this crisis has been packaged for russians is the polar opposite of how all of us around the rest of the world understand it which is that ukraine is the aggressor there is potentially genocide here's the word there he's used it time and time again um going on against russian speakers in these separatist areas there have been mass graves uncovered war crimes committed and the united states together with its western allies has been and he said it there pumping weapons along with nato into ukraine and so that is what russians a lot of them anyway will understand of what is happening here uh and so what we heard there from vladimir putin was this world view that he is basically he draws his legitimacy from the past you know this is the idea that he will rebuild the former soviet union and he has you know a people who are willing to listen to that message we had a lot of these kind of ethno-religious nationalist messages the sentiment that the orthodox church was it was undermined kiev is preparing to act against the orthodox church and like you said they're uh you know preparing to uh create nuclear weapons i mean this it is known that ukraine was a place where a lot of weapons ended up at the end of the cold war so he plays on these kind of thoughts and ideas or understandings that russian people have and then builds on them time and time again i do think though that what's going to be really interesting to see and you just said there about boris johnson swiftly condemning what he's heard and we're likely to see this package of of sanctions it'd be really interesting to see just what the sanctions are because let's perhaps look at maybe the possibility that for vladimir putin was this the best worst option for him he didn't expect perhaps the west to show such and on a united front against him this time round remember looking 2008 back to the war with georgia where he was it's the same playbook annex announced that an area is independent and tried to rebuild the soviet union the ukraine war last time around the annexation of crimea maybe he's trying to get out of it this time who knows yeah we certainly do not know and as you uh pointed out there james the narrative that he has built over the last several days in russia is precisely the same narrative that the west feared he would he would actually try to build and then and then express through the images that they've seen on russian television and in the story that he told the russian people there tonight he talked about the same old words from the west nothing has changed in their position that they have blackmailed us uh through sanctions and that they will likely sanction us again uh the main question at this point again after declaring those two russian uh speaking russian separatist regions in the donbass as independent signing the document there moments ago what appeared to be the document confirming what he told the russian people the question now is does anything follow this as far as uh military steps military intervention with the some 150 000 plus russian troops amassed all along the ukrainian border particularly in that region you know we've shown you the troops at the north the south and along the eastern front which certainly borders the donbass i want to bring in our chief global affairs correspondent martha raddatz who anchored this week from ukraine over the weekend and martha i know your sources in the u.s military have been telling you all along you do not amass troops along the border this size this scope with military hospitals clinics for blood uh if you don't have a plan to follow suit with some sort of strategy here that would involve them and that starts with the secretary of defense on down they do believe an invasion is coming i don't think this this speech changes it it probably escalates it you know david you keep referring to telling the russian people we have to remember what he did tonight was speak to his nation think about when our president speaks to the nation if we are about to take military action or anything else this was a very sobering speech for the russian people and what he laid out escalated this situation he kept saying things like ukraine is not just a neighbor it is an inherent part of our history our culture our spiritual space we cannot help but react to what ukraine is doing it is like a knife at our throat he talks about nato he talks about the us to me this message was if we lose ukraine we lose our empire and the speech was indeed rambling but the message was the same over and over and over and as you said david they have 150 000 troops at least on all three sides of this country in a position that a refuel the weapons are un are uploaded they are ready to attack if vladimir putin gives the final say we've already heard our president president biden say he thinks vladimir putin has made a decision to invade now whether this is a speech to his nation to say we don't have to invade the whole country or whether it's going forward i think most officials believe that an invasion is coming david martha stick with me here because i want to underscore a point you just made there with vladimir putin and the language he used when it came to ukraine he said if we lose ukraine he also talked about the leadership the president of ukraine essentially comparing ukraine and the leadership there uh to being a puppet for the u.s for the west uh he talked
about the the russian language not being used in kiev anymore a sort of cleanse of the culture there certainly was not a recognition of independence and sovereignty that the west is trying to protect for ukraine none whatsoever david none at all and that was the message look what he's doing to our russia look what the united states is doing to our russia look what nato is doing to our russia look at president zielinski from the ukraine is doing to us they are the threat we are not the threat that is putin's message from the beginning but he laid it out in very very stark terms martha raddatz with us from ukraine martha thank you again vladimir putin telling the russian people just moments ago the decision has been made now his decision to recognize the independence of donetsk and lugansk of course two significant parts of the donbass region as independent he said he warned the ukrainians to end the hostilities otherwise warning that there could be russian action to follow of course western leaders fear that what we've been watching with the amassing of the troops along the eastern border with ukraine could mean that he would possibly send in those troops to help secure that independence you're looking at that small little area there that that's surrounded in yellow lines there that's the donbass region uh two significant areas of that vladimir putin declaring as independent from ukraine of course these developments are moving quickly as soon as we learn more from the bible administration the white house about whether or not sanctions will be implemented immediately we'll come back back on the air and let you know in the meantime our coverage continues abc news live abcnews.com and i'll be back with the entire team you just saw here on world news tonight i'm david muir in new york good day this has been a special report from abc news
2022-02-25