[000:00:00;00] ah ah, this is dw is coming to live from berlin. it's been called europe's darkest hour since the end of world war 2. ah, air raid siren sound in the ukrainian capital t of is the president below the muse . zalinski says a full scale russian invasion is underway. so last he said his country was being attacked and urged people not to panic. as rewards of explosions came in from

cities cross ukraine. russian president vladimir putin has tried to justify the decision to send in troops by saying it is a life and death decision for the future of russia. the attack on his neighbor has drawn international outbreak. ah. hello, i'm terry martin. welcome to the program. russia has launched a military assault on ukraine hitting targets across the country. you as president, joe biden has condemned the attack as unjustified and unprovoked. here in germany, chancellor, all of sholtes said it was a terrible day for ukraine in a dark day for europe. russian president vladimir putin announced the move in an unscheduled television address shortly before 6 am moscow time. he warned the world that any attempt to interfere would lead to quote consequences you've never seen. within minutes. explosions were reported in cities around ukraine,

including odessa. cor keefe. i'm a toss mario paul and kia, ukrainian leader below the muse lensky said. it was a full scale invasion and that russia was attacking military infrastructure throughout the country. and border guards don't usually use citizens not to urge citizens not to panic and told them to stay indoors or political correspondent, thomas sparrow, is with me here in the studio. thomas, talk us through what we know so far. well, very tense moments in ukraine, very tense moments as well in europe, some of the images that we're just seeing there on, on the screen that we've just seen there on the screen. although there are and verified they are reportedly of attacks that are happening in the eastern part of ukraine, in particular. some experts son's mildest mentioning that it could be military targets in particular, that have been 1st targeted by, by this attack. but it's still all very unclear in general,

very unclear on the one hand about what is happening in this, in part of, of ukraine. also very unclear as to what the motivations behind is and what the reaction will be. so it's all very much developing both on the ground with those images that we, that we see, but also with a political reaction that will hear from european capitals and also from washington . what's gonna happen now from a political perspective is 1st, a lot of very stock reactions, very deep warnings. we've seen that already from some of the political leaders calling get a dock our for europe. one of the most difficult moments is well war 2. and then what steps can be taken beyond those words? one step that is expected by analysts is further sanctions towards russia that could hit the financial infrastructure even more related to russia's energy sector . also, when it comes to banking the swift, swift mechanism,

it will be important to see what they agree. these leaders when they meet, for example, under the g 7 format, or under the us of a nato, a meeting, or even a european union leader meeting. so this is what we'll see coming up next, political reaction which has come after these images. i will say that i mistress are still and verified. okay, so we're, we of course, are expecting severe sanctions to be imposed on russia as a result of this attack on ukraine. we were just looking at some pictures there of some smoke rising above a city. of course, these are unconfirmed reports, but we're hearing reports of fighting around the country. stay with us, thomas, and let's i think i understand that right now we can cross over to our correspond it funny for chuck who is standing by in the ukrainian capital here. funny, what can you tell us? what's happening there this morning? 5 is actually the national anthem in ukraine just stopped playing just before that you've heard. sirens are going off here, which is

a clear sign actually are an urgency for people to take shelter wherever they are at that point whereby it's possible it is a very difficult situation. here we are in the capital of ukraine. nobody would have thought, even though they were a lot of indications over the past week that an actual assault to really be at the re, our politics playing out here on the ground. he and ukraine. a lot of people here, ukraine and keith have still hoped that this entire conflict in russia could be solved, negotiation diplomacy, but that door is close. actually, at this point, what is happening is an escalation. but just to give you a little bit of a picture, i have experienced this entire a difficult morning to say so i how i was still in bad and i heard i thought it people of closing the doors in the hotel where we are. and it wasn't doors being close explosions and these it shortly after who am this morning when i have

a lot more i made that address to the nation. the surprised televised address that he's going to r as start a, what he calls a military operation. but that's not the way it's being understood here in ukraine . in fact, ukraine's president zelinski pointed out what russia wants quote, is to destroy the state of ukraine. very, very, very, some difficult developments. and i'll also just for i on the ground that the practical situation or the way people react. you're right now, your cues are forming a gasoline stations. people are packing up, trying to flee towards the west and part of ukraine across the border traffic as being reported from colleagues there were trying to cross into neighboring countries. it is alarming, and it is a very, very critical morning here in ukraine. ok, we're just looking at some pictures right now. funny, i don't know if you can see them where you are of spoons of black smoke and some

flames beneath or smoke up. it appears to be an industrial complex, but we're trying. we're having difficulty finding out exactly what is going on in the country. what is under attack, what? what targets are being bought are being hit? what more can you tell us about that? according to official information here, it's a critical infrastructure that can be on the target, the cities and various cities of ukraine, military infrastructure. now russia claims that they only interested to say, so in the military infrastructure, but that's not what we're hearing from the official statements from the ukrainian government. they say that they are going to shall also a civilian infrastructure. so they're asking people to stay at home, not to use public transportation, and really when they hear the sirens going off, that's really not a moment to think about what to do next. but really just to go and find

a safe place to go. it's really hard to confirm and verify even what is happening across the country right now as we are hearing so many different reports. what we know at this point, what we've been knowing in terms of the estimates of troops that are basically and circling ukraine, those estimated 190000 russian troops. it out to was the nose on the north, towards the northern, the border as a neighbouring bella. roost rainy. bring bella luce, to the east to the south. yes. speaking here, a massive about a massive military troop. that's a round ability. it's really not the time that people are actually trying to believe that there's going to be any de escalation or that there's even a room for that. at this point, everyone is bracing for the worst and he's trying to make up their mind. is this the time to leave, or should they stay on and actually support the troops, the ukrainian troops, mentally, by staying here not panicking? funny. we know that a lot. a lot of me as

a lensky has declared martial law. can you tell us what that means? for the country and whether you're seeing a massive mobilization of ukrainian troops, because it's hard to gauge whether the ukrainian troops are actually resisting this onslaught. well, 1st of all, a state of emergency has been already declared approved the pipe by parliament later side by presidency. lensky yesterday, which is in effect right now for the next 30 days, which can be extended to another 30 days. but things have read escalated so quickly that once that speech by letting me put in was made, a martial law was approved here. for keith, which means that checkpoints are going to be set up by the ukrainian authorities, which means you will be checked your documents while you are actually on the street . and as i say, when you hear sirens, you have to take shelter. you have to make sure you're not out on the street, marcia. * law means this is not the time where you as

a citizen should be outside. it is where you have to listen carefully what the ukrainian government says and still can of course make a decision based on your assessment. but it is highly of it is highly advised that people stay at home. now, what else can happen? and that's in fact, the fear that now that the marshal law is in place, people will start to panic. in fact, 8 years ago when the ukranian revolution played played out here at the my dad behind me. at that time, people who are running a, basically to the supermarket, a stocking up on food, on everything that they may need. seeing that there's an escalation here on the ground that was the key of 8 years ago. this didn't happen this time around. in fact, over the course of the past week, people who are still thinking it is a visible and they did not even consider that an assault. and keith is going to take place people who are actually buying guns with buying an omission and over

making sure that they're going to protect their families, that they can act in self defense. now this is to change because as we are seeing pictures and we are hearing information from verified sources that people are really right now the, the wants want to leave the country, are going to leave a right now. the already long lines that are for, at the gasoline station, people are trying to move towards the vast towards leave it to the biggest vesta city. i, you grade and try to the, because really, nobody knows how this is going to develop further any. thank you very much for now . that was our correspondent, funny pie chart in the ukranian capital kiev. and we have a team coverage on the ground in ukraine this morning. our other correspondent, one of our other correspondence is nick connelly. he's in the north east of the country. he's near car kid. that is, that is ukraine 2nd largest cities. i am told he joined us on the phone from the

nick. what's the latest where you are? i, terry? well, i'm about to do this on bus tourism, mentioning to the rest of the distance, which i mentioned plain making explosions. coming to me bringing this and just to me, extensive means strange jewelry. distance people don't really need to have to choose choose at the gas station,

the banks trying to cash information coming here, which has 30 run out to run through the town. all right, now trying to trade station. i think most people are actually getting to where you anywhere else to go to didn't have the money, have to be cash to meet next week, we're trying to get an idea about the scale of this attack. we're seeing pictures coming in. we can't identify exactly where they're coming from, but they appear to be, you know, these are seen plumes of smoke. what you're seeing on the screen are where viewers are seeing on their screens right now. are rising over different parts of the landscape. planes we're seeing, we've seen flashes of light appears to be some sort of fire on the outskirts of, of cities. can you give us an idea, nick, of the scale of this attack? exactly. what is being targeted? it is,

does not appear to be limited to the low hands and done yet. regions of the country in the east appears to be there appear to be other parts as well. we heard from the russian defense ministry that, that infrastructure military infrastructure in ukraine is being targeted. can you give us a sense of the scale of this attack? yes, so this is, this is not restricted on back. it seems to be all across the country, not just in these countries. those are coming from next me at the west. the bolts of and talk all about our phone keeps airport. busy maybe the session that's in tempe to prevent native western countries sending a message to help crane. we also have a posts of tapes coming across the board about the big developments that these extra 2 weeks $30000.00 troops. and that makes, depending on how much they tell us, because you can tell me what to do with those additions to, to 1000,

to the border with what's coming in of russian troops coming in by c. c. so really offensive recruiting is under siege from all sides. for now, people at central station people not raising their voices. yes, they're very much people have to pay for it. it's, it's teams. it's where those conflicts kind of don't back up there would be claiming that these were independent separate just now it's recognized them basically thrown off the mosque and midgets to being behind those separatists regimes. and then it's a very critical situation here. people looking to ship from people saying they haven't heard enough yet from the central government. they're not getting clear, but people here used to lying on themselves. people have bags, they need to leave with cash, with their documents close. so this is a country, the added pencil, mentally prepared for this is a very, a warning. and jason,

just for our viewers watching these pictures. i'm told that this is a military airport, where you see black plumes of smoke rising above nick. we know that the russian army, of course, the russian military is, is enormous. and it far outweighs anything that ukraine could put up against it. but ukraine has bowed to defend itself. or you, can you tell me whether we are getting, whether you're getting reports of ukrainian forces resisting the russian onslaught . we don't get a whole lot of information from now, but that's also gone to communication problems into that outages. so i'm really not concentration to do as much as i'd like to see on the ground. so 5 days and i'm just getting ready. we're leaving getting some slides more time heading to come back today. definitely we're on the way we're pulling the course to do that.

obviously because it's cool on korean, so the people to lay down there to go home. i don't think that's going to achieve a great deal. yes, it might be individual individual trips to set up a service, but this is the country that look at this company for 8 years and there is some number of people who are very much they get almost half a 1000000 ukrainians have so do it in the don't buy conflict people. ready have to be called upon to turn up very quickly people. ready with military experience, who are not new to war and say, convention kind of conflict between holly high tech forces and you know, one that's going to be the bumps. but these people and they know the code to the town and they have the motivation to defend themselves. so i think this could become very difficult, but not the complex very, just make any predictions for now. but i think the way this is up in the way, the versus that was really seems to be doing that best to put some question and you

can be so open the rest, which is just like mainly gram. i can get someone to take the problems. nick, thank you very much for now. that was our correspondent, nick connelly, who is just outside of ukraine, 2nd largest city car, keith in the north east of the country. now it's a, bring you up to date here on some of the latest reactions to ukraine's attack to russia's attack on ukraine coming in this morning, ukraine's foreign minister dimitra coolly. bob went on twitter to say that putting has just launched a full scale invasion of ukraine. peaceful ukrainian cities are under strikes. this is a war of aggression. ukraine will defend itself and will win the world can and must stop hooting. he says, the time to act is now. here's the united nations secretary general. you tony will get terrace here directly appealed to the russian president,

sank. president putin in the name of humanity, bring your troops back to russia. this conflict must stop. now. the german chancellor. lo, schultz just issued a statement saying the russian attack on ukraine is a blatant violation of international law. it cannot be justified by any thing. germany condemns in the strongest possible terms, this unscrupulous act by president putin. our solidarity goes out to crane and it's people well with me and the studios are political correspondent, thomas sparrow. thomas, of course you've been following this up from the beginning. we've been discussing germany's reaction to developments over the past few weeks. leading up to this. germany is face considerable criticism for it's a approach to the crisis of criticism, at least from t f, and from some of germany's nato allies, particularly estonian in the baltics and who feel exposed by this crisis. what is

germany's position we just heard from all our shorts? obviously condemning the attack. what is germany? what is germany going to do now? but that, that statement by allah shows is important on another level. because when he stretched his, that germany believed that this is a breach of international law. that gives you the necessary context to understand why the west is reacting in the way. it is reacting because it believes that rushes attack now, but also previously. russia's former recognition of 2 regions in ukraine goes against the scenario, the peaceful scenario that europe had built after the 2nd will, will, it goes against the principles that have been enforced in europe since after the 2nd world war 2, the peaceful coexistence of states. a fact that borders cannot, cannot be redrawn by one country that negotiation and diplomatic waste must be the way to, to solve problems when the west,

when germany believes that this action by russia goes against international law and goes against those principles. that's why you're seeing reaction, for example, in the form of sanctions. when we talk about sanctions, we have to also understand that the center that had been imposed on russia so far are only seen as initial sanctions. the west wanted to keep them some room for, for maneuver, some room to see how they could react if russia went a step too far. if russia did exactly, we're seeing right now. so we're also hearing not only here in germany, but also hearing for example, that it was ref on the line. the president of the european commission will give a statement soon. it will be interesting to see where the she also focuses on necessary steps that have to be taken. now that basically means further sanctions that could target specifically rushes financial sector that could target specifically rushes energy sector as well. and when we talk about renters, energy sector, and when we talk about sanctions,

we also have to understand the countries like germany and that something that we had from on and in a babel. the german for a minister have stress that germany is also understands that they have that they may have to pay it, have a cost to their own economy if they ought to make sure that the situation is result . and that's something that we clearly heard from germany's foreign minister in babylon. and that's one of the reasons why germany decided to stop a very important but very controversial energy project. namely, a gas pipe bank called in north stream to pipeline which joins russia and germany which is already finished until the re been built. but he was waiting for regulatory approval and it's this regulatory approval that will now not happen, which basically means that the notary to pipe and will not be able to enter and, and actually send bass from russia to germany. okay, there's been a of course, a lot of focus on the north stream to pipeline. as you say, it's the approval of it has now been suspended. there's a good chance that it may be put on ice and indefinitely,

but other sanctions are being discussed. and i'm sure that the united states and european union are trying to coordinate those right now. one of those considered sanctions is the swift payment system. now the swift payment system, it's a bit complicated, but this is how payments are made within the international financial system. and if russia is shot out of that, which is considered a very hard sanction, this will have consequences, not just for russia, but for also for other countries that have dealings, commercial dealings with russia. and those countries include italy, italy's banks, austria's banks, and germany, of course, being ger, or europe's biggest economic player, is germany going to support cutting russia out of swift? what do you think? and that's one of the reasons why this sanction on russia related to the swift system was not necessarily imposed already. that's why in that 1st trance of sanctions that we saw,

we were talking of other types of sanctions. because obviously when you impose those songs and when a country decides when in this case, a group of countries decide to impose sanctions, they also have to consider what effect those sanctions will have on them in an interconnected world, in a globalized world. and that is something that has to be considered also from the local impact that that may have. and that's why this decision on nordstrom now, by germany, to, to freeze the project, even if that means that they will have to pay economy cost themselves was welcomed by germany's political allies from an economic perspective halting. busy north stream for now is risky, there is a certain risk, but it's important to stress that it was still not sending russian gas to germany still not working. so basically those who say that that sanction is not very effective in practical terms, do not necessarily understand that the importance of that sanction comes from the political perspective from the political message that its sense of condemnation to

rush on the one hand of support to germany's political allies on the other was thank you so much. you know, our political course when a thomas sparrow you are watching the w news and our special coverage of russia's attack on ukraine. i'm terry martin. russia has indeed launched a military assault on ukraine hitting targets across the country. us president joe biden has condemned the attack as unjustified and unprovoked. here in germany, transfer off shoulds said it was a terrible day for ukraine and a dark day for europe. russian president vladimir putin announced the move in an unscheduled television address shortly before 6 am moscow time. he warned the world that any attempt to interfere would lead to quote, the consequences you have never seen. within minutes. explosions were reported in cities around ukraine, including odessa called keith cremmit, tolorisk maria pole, and she f crania leader ballade mirrors. the lansky said it was

a full scale invasion and that russia was attacking military infrastructure throughout the country. and border guards. the earth citizens not to panic and to stay indoors or more, i'm joined by vladimir s a paul from d w's russian service. he is monitoring, of course, all the developing situation in ukraine and in russia. first of all, blood man, tell us what you're hearing from your sources in russia about what is happening in ukraine. well, mr. of defense reporting that ukrainian air defense systems are taken down and talked about 5 ukrainian airports attacked by russian new south reports about 2 ukrainian plains being shut down in the area of eastern ukraine. them the area of the ganske by the so called folks people. but he's safe

proclaimed republic. so it's a lot of going on in the ground. well, let's listen into a bit of what let me put in said when he announced this attack, let's listen him. but when you put bells, when you say, when they try to interfere with them and even more so to create threats for our country, people should know that russia's response will be immediate and will lead you to such consequences that you have never experienced in your history. can you stop by me did, did the russian president say what he's trying to achieve with his attack? he declared to mature beach in the very early hours on this morning. he declared to mangold tourists, demilitarize the ukraine, which i will translate to the destruction of the military infrastructure of the country. and the 2nd goal declared by their presence. fortune is dennis, if occasion of the grand,

which is the origin of the russian government in the morning of the universe of flooding the means to bring basically bring down your great government, saw us, we'll probably try to achieve the goals, does not protein have the backing of the russian population in launching this attack. this is a very good question. say it, the goal is rasa was taken over a crimea. it was a huge wave of inspiration, a huge, but there was a gray from nick and coming back of crimea in the russians. warning was very much greeted by the russian public. now, 8 years later, and the whole lot back on the neighboring country in the countries ukraine. we just has a very strong bonds to the rasa. on many levels could trace in other reactions in their house and public v. c. the economy consequences already developing their own

herbal in the freefall already did this to the stocks and changing russian stopped basically because of the free for the russian russian stock exchange. so i would expect the reaction of the russian public would be different than just talking a couple of days to go buy to some friends in oscar, which were completely shocked by the very ideal rasa that taking ukraine. so i would suppose there actually would be different this time, but it's too early to talk about flooding me. forgive me if i interrupt you in just a mom or expecting and address by the european commission president upon the lion, which we're going to cross over to live as soon as that begins. but as we wait for that, let me ask you about the sanctions that have already been imposed on russia in reaction to russia, recognizing the independence of the, of the, of the donuts region. what impact their sanctions having i'm sorry, we're going to call to our correspondent in, in brussels. i'm told we have alexander from nomine, who is standing by,

as we wait for that address from the european commission president of the, on the line. so what can we expect an example from the, from the speech? how was europe going to react? was the last on the line the commission president will be, i think the 1st senior figure to addressed reporters of life this morning. and in statement are issued earlier today, she already made clear that the european union is going to impose massive and severe sanctions in response to what the european union is describing as an unprecedented and unprovoked military aggression by russia. and we know that the european commission has been working on those