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On February 24, the Russian President said that in response to a request by the heads of the Donbass republics he had made a decision to carry out a special military operation.

Consequences of a possible conflict between Russia and NATO are obvious for all involved parties, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday commenting on a possible membership of Ukraine with NATO.

“Talks about Ukraine’s joining NATO became more active recently. Do you realise what it could have led to? Or can still lead to today?” Putin said.

If it is one of the NATO countries, than in accordance with the agreement on the establishment of the organisation, the rest of the members must support it in case of a military conflict, Putin said.

He noted that Ukraine was likely to encroach on Crimea and this is when Russia should embrace itself fighting against NATO.

“Do you understand the consequences or not? I think that everyone understands the consequences,” Putin added.

“Despite their statement, which was made by the British foreign secretary, when she blabbed that NATO could be involved in the conflict, and we immediately had to make a decision to put our deterrence forces on high alert, a reaction followed; they said they didn’t mean anything of that sort, but no one checked her! The woman! The foreign secretary!

“Did anyone say anything on that matter? You know, it’s her personal opinion, pay no attention! No one [said] anything,” Putin said at a meeting with women from the cabin crews of Russian airlines on Saturday.

Russia cannot ignore Ukraine’s intention to gain nuclear status, as it could be helped from “across the ocean,” after which NATO would become Russia’s foe, Russian President Vladimir Putin said.

“Now there’s been talk about (Ukraine) gaining nuclear status; that is, acquiring nuclear weapons. We can’t just pass such things over. Especially considering that we know how the so-called West behaves toward Russia,” Putin said at a meeting on Saturday.

Ukraine has retained nuclear competencies since Soviet era, Putin said. “As concerns the enrichment of nuclear materials, they can organise this work.

“They also have missile competencies ( . . . ) and they’d develop them and make it, and they’d be helped to do that from across the ocean, who would then say that they won’t recognise this nuclear status, that they did it themselves, then put those systems under control, and from that second, from that very second, Russia’s fate would be absolutely different,” he said.

“Then it’s our strategic foe, and they wouldn’t even need to have intercontinental ballistic missiles, they’d keep us in their nuclear sights right here, and that’s it,” Putin said. “How can we just pass that over? This is an absolutely real threat, this is not some far-fetched nonsense,” he said.

“There has also been increasingly more active talk about Ukraine’s admission to NATO. Do you understand what this could have led to or still can? If it’s a NATO country, then, in line with the treaty on that organisation’s establishment, all the other members of the alliance have to support that country in case of a military conflict,” he said.

As for the economic issues the Russian President mentioned that Russia will develop domestic air transport services and build its own planes under conditions of the Western sanctions, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at a meeting on Rossiya 24 television.

“What will we do? We will now, of course, be increasing domestic transportation. Where we will fly abroad, we will fly. We will be working on changing the situation”.

The president said he believes the current situation has both minuses and “pluses for the development of our own infrastructure.”We will develop our own aviation, we will build our own aircraft such as MC-21, Ilyushin Il-114-300, Baikal.

We will continue developing the aerodrome network,” he said.

Putin also said foreign airlines will not be able to use Trans-Siberian routes due to mutual restriction of flights to some countries. That will increase the amount of time in flight, and therefore kerosene consumption, which will increase the prices of tickets.

Russia is fully self-sufficient in basic foodstuffs, President Vladimir Putin at the meeting

The President recalled that thanks to focusing on the development of agriculture, the country had earned $25 billion in exports by last year.

“But it is not even in the volume of exports that matter, the point is that we are fully self-sufficient in all food products, basic products, we have completely covered the needs of the country,” Putin said.

“But there was some luck in this misfortune,” the Russian leader said hinting that the Western sanctions had made Russia develop import-substitution.

“We will also act this way in the field of aircraft manufacturing and in transportation,” Putin added.

“I assume that this tendency will eventually be cancelled as the situation changes,” he said.

Russia will view any country trying to declare a no-fly zone over Ukraine as a participant in an armed conflict, Russian President Vladimir Putin said.

“We’re hearing now that there is a need to declare a no-fly zone over Ukrainian territory. This can’t be done over Ukrainian territory itself; it can be done only from the territories of some neighbouring states. But we’ll view any movement in this direction as involvement in an armed conflict by the country from whose territory threats to our military service members are posed,” Putin said on Saturday.

“We’ll instantly view them as participants in a military conflict, and then we won’t care what kind of members they are. Excuse me, I mean members of what organisations,” he added.

Putin said he hoped “this is understood and things won’t go as far as that.”

Up to 14 000 civilians in the Donetsk and Lugansk republics have been killed since 2014, Russian President Vladimir Putin said

“What I am going to say may sound harsh. Yet the situation forces me to say aloud what has just occurred to me.

“As you may have heard, stray dogs these days begin to attack people in various regions. Some get injured. There have even been lethal cases,” Putin said.

At as certain point, people “begin to poison and shoot these animals.” He made a reservation that even the stray dogs were a separate problem and “the local authorities are obliged to address it.”

“Now listen to this: the Donbass people are NOT stray dogs! Yet, 13,000-14,000 of them have been killed there over years. More than 500 children have been killed or crippled,” Putin said.

He believes what is particularly intolerable is the so-called civilised West has preferred not to notice this for eight years.

“Moreover, the authorities in Kiev began to say outright lately that they are not going to implement these agreements (Minsk-2 – TASS).

“They have been saying so all along on TV and on the Internet – everywhere! They state in public: “We don’t like it, we won’t do it,” Putin explained.