give it as a most ordinary year, and if in all the many conversations i've had with other leaders to day, i've heard several things. the 1st one is that we're supported and ungrateful to every nation that helps ukraine in concrete ways of lee. but there is a 2nd thing. we are alone in defending our nation dollar bill who is ready to fight with. i'm not. i don't see anybody. jeff never took who is ready to give you crane a guarantee of joining nato. everyone is afraid she has. she will yet richard, can we disagree with the ukranian president? well, of course, i mean he's right, there's nobody is there fighting alongside the ukrainians. and he's right that ukraine does not have a visible pathway to a to membership of nato, which is one aspect of this crisis that we've been witnessing recently that ukraine

wants to join nato and vladimir putin. the president, russia is adamant that it must not join nature. i think for the ukrainians. the fact that this invasion is happening, but just underscores the reasons why they wanted to join nato in the 1st place to stop something like this from happening. but all the western members of nato have made it clear, joe biden has made it clear that they are not going to send in people to fight alongside ukrainians. some western states have provided a weapons to the ukrainians in recent weeks, but yeah, i mean, on the face of it and well, in simple fact, of course he's right there is nobody fighting alongside him. and they're certainly not going to fast track ukrainian to nature at this point. and the reason for that is that the western light simply does not want to direct confrontation with russia . you train us the simple fact and i think the protocols, reliance,

positive you cannot join if you have a conflict on but now it's not even on the agenda for just another question of i may have a conflict on, but now it's not even on the agenda. for just another question of i me about the amount of the kremlin a lot has been said about the intentions of lot in your prison system. playing a guessing game with intelligence services pretty much. and now what would happen? it needs to be said, but he mentioned in one of his speech is something that many have interpreted as a possible nuclear threat. yeah. yeah. i mean, watching putin of the last few months, it's been a combination watching what he does and watching what he says. and the strongest signal, the putin was preparing an invasion of ukraine with the gigantic force that he surrounded ukraine with from the north, from the east and from the south. a force. by the time we reached this point was

clear, was sufficiently large to invade ukraine. why wouldn't you position that force if you didn't want to do it? and the other aspect is what he's been saying, and he's been making the speeches this week. he's made too long speeches to the russian nation at the beginning of the week when he announced that he was recognizing these break way. easton ukraine republic says independent states in that speech essentially said that you claim has no right to exist as a sovereign state. and then the 2nd speech was announcing what he described as a special military operation. what we're witnessing now is a major invasion of ukraine. and in that speech, it was a very, very aggressive speech. and in that speech, he made this comment which is being interpreted as an implicit threat to, to use nuclear weapons. so i just read a little bit for this right now. so i want to say something very important for those who may be tempted to interfere in these developments from the outside. no

matter who tries to stand in our way, the consequences will be such as you have never seen in your entire history. we haven't seen an atomic bomb go off for a long time. yeah, no, you start. yeah. not since 945, the americans of c targeting japan. now that has been interpreted the nuclear threat. there been a couple of comments from, from western leaders on this. joe biden was asked last night after press conference to see what does he think of that? he said, i have no idea of putin intentions then quickly moved on to the next subject. he didn't want to be drawing very far on that joy if you agree on the french foreign minister commented on this. and he said, i think vladimir putin must also understand that the atlantic alliance is a nuclear alliance. and that is all i will say about this. so, you know, sort of pointing out, they've got them to them. so what is pushing trying to achieve with this work? well, it, it, of course is

a message don't interfere or i may respond with nuclear weapons. what does he mean by interference? it's not he doesn't define clearly what he means. does he mean military intervention? well, as we've just said, military intervention is not in the cause. no western countries said that they would do that. does he mean something below that level? well, that nuclear response would be huge exaggeration. so i think this is a troubling a comment by putin because it indicates that he's ready to use language that, that goes far beyond the reality of the situation on language is 40 years old. i recall my childhood richard walker, chief international thanks so much for that. germany's former, has their angler merkel has spoken out about russia's invasion of ukraine. merkel was in office during russia's annexation of crimea when she insisted on keeping communication open with moscow. but she said, the situation is different. this time. in a statement to the jury press agency, dpi, merkel said this war of aggression by russia march

a profound turning point in the history of europe. after the end of the cold war, there is no justification whatsoever for this blatant breach of international law. and i condemn it in the strongest possible terms. and richard, i'm going to turn to jam what you make a statement. yeah, this is fascinating. that angle america has come out, made a public statement. she's been really pretty much out of sight since leaving office late last year. and i think, well, this comment from her comes to the time where her government and the 16 years in which she's been in office, has come under quite heavy fire and recent days for completely underestimating that the threat vladimir putin post and for pursuing a completely wrong headed or wishful thinking attitude to relations with russia.

germany has long seen it itself as a kind of bridge builder to russia. this is something that's particularly a feature of the social democratic party, not miracles, party, but a party that was long and coalition with her. and although she was someone who, it was clear, having grown up in east germany, she had no illusions about about russian power and about vladimir putin. she's a russian speaker. she, she was able to engage with him in a way that many others weren't. but she's phase criticism, even from one of her very close, is ally indirect criticism from someone could actually come about. who was germany defense minister under the last years of angular medical, she's actually the woman who, anglo metal at one point position to be her successor. and she put out a tweet yesterday saying, i'm so angry at ourselves for our historical failure of the georgia crimea. and don

bass, we have not prepared anything that would have really deterred. and this came also after the head of the german army said yesterday in a linked in post that he was fed up because he was in a position that the army had been so starved investment that it had nothing that it could really offer to nato allies. in eastern europe to protect it in this situation. so macro on the defensive here, expressing her disgust of what has happened. but i think there's going to be a lot more of this kind of conversation here in germany going forward about whether it made some severe mistakes in dealing with russia and that it needs a more realistic approach in future to dealing with authoritarian leaders. ok, richard walker. international editor, thanks so much. russia's invasion has been met with horror in many parts of the world. people have been gathering outside russian embassies to protest putin's actions and express their support for ukraine. but in russia,

taking part in public demonstrations could result in immediate detention. still, people took to the streets in multiple russian cities to decry the war, risking arrest even prison time to show the world that russia is not united behind president putin. thousands came out across the country, chanting no to war. they were flaunting a ban on demonstrations. police arrested over 1700 people, half of them in the capital. moscow. authorities warned they could be charged with a crime with, i don't want russia to attack the crane like this. yeah, i have grandparents with the so anyways, i would like what happened is a shame. like many of us have relatives and friends from ukraine. and this is

a betrayal of them. e, at the pre thank you so much like russian stage, perhaps the most daring display of opposition. but not the only one. demonstrations of solidarity sprung up in cities around the world times square and new york saw a massive ukrainian flagon, frilled b. the brandenburg gate and berlin was also visited by a crowd of ukraine's yellow and blue national colors. as this past he had was many of us thought it was impossible, but it happened. i woke up this morning and it brought me to tears. i never to mo touchless shouldn't like leash. i think it's appalling because it's an illegal war of aggression and it has to stop. it's important that there is peace in europe and this is a worst case scenario with the systems of us. it's operating on quantum, a condemnation of pollutants, war, and a message of solidarity with those and basements and bomb shelters across ukraine.

and dw correspondent, emily sherwin joins me now in the studio. emily, you've covered a lot of demonstrations like the ones we just saw. how significant is the opposition to putin's war to think? i think it's really significant that people actually took to the streets yesterday . i think that really shows how deep this shock for many people was that the, just the fact that, that, you know, put in, took russia to war at all. i think was deeply shocking for many people. because you have to understand that the, the atmosphere in russia and moscow where i just was at the moment, is really that you can't demonstrate you can't protest, you can't take to the streets. that became very clear, you know, at the beginning of 2021, there were these big protests against the arrest of opposition politicians. alexey navine, there was a huge craft down, and we saw that again yesterday, hundreds of people took to the streets rights group say that almost 2000 people were arrested across the country. but people did it anyway. you know,

people came out anyway because they, even though they knew that they were going to be arrested essentially, we don't know, of course, the numbers of people who are in favor of this war who are against this war surveys are probably to be kind of distrusted at this point, yeah. especially, you know, government surveys, but my sense, really from speaking to people is that everyone is shocked. most people i spoke to yesterday said this can't be happening. yeah. do you have any russian friends and, or following twitter or post that said, so you read pretty much you were, you said, you know, i'm in moscow recently and we could share with the viewers. you were that d w correspondent based in moscow and in the post. so you'd space for just under 5 years before the kremlin decided to essentially shut the bureau, move that was to crow, denounced by the rush, german foreign ministry, r is press freedom. i'm just saying all this because you should know the situation about of press freedom in russia. can people find out about putting war in ukraine reliably? well, as you said, there's been

a crackdown on the media going on for several years. dot crackdown has intensified in the past few months and also, you know, from the beginning of 2021. as i mentioned, krygier critical media outlets are still reporting. there are still some critical media outlets that are reporting also about this war and very critically, including, you know, the radio station at how much glee norway g as yet, which is fairly well known as an opposition newspaper state media of course are falling in line with the kremlin, while you are talking about this is the liberation, talking about the ukranian, nazis that need to be purged. and all of these things you know, that we've been hearing from the kremlin this while this rhetoric there is also a new directive. now for the media saying that they can only report official information that they're getting from russian official sources. so it looks like

this is going to become more difficult at the moment. critical media outlets are still reporting, but there may be in the coming weeks or days, you know, a real crackdown on that. also, on the internet. you might remember that russia has the possibility to shut the internet, cut its own internet off from the world wide web, essentially, you know, block social media websites. we've seen that kind of thing happening before, you know, for short periods of time. so we may be seeing some observers or saying and russia that kind of thing happening in the coming days in the story extreme situation. ok, or could be a hinge point than that. if i may just turn back to, to keep, the russians are advancing all their way, all the way to the capital. it seems for multiple reports. and it appears pretty clear from what putin has been saying that he wants zelinski presidents lensky out of the way as part of his denot vacation program despite and having.