Kremlin: Special operation ongoing according to plan

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The Russian military operation in Ukraine is proceeding in accordance with previously set goals, Kremlin Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said in an interview with CNN on Tuesday. 

"It [the special operation] is going on strictly in accordance with the plans and with purposes that were established beforehand," he said, adding that no one was expecting it to take "a couple of days."

Peskov added that the operation in Ukraine was "a serious operation with serious purposes."

In his words, the operation’s goals have not been achieved yet. "Not yet, we are speaking about a special military operation that is going on," the Kremlin Spokesperson added.

Kiev’s plans to start a military operation in Donbass

Russia saw that Kiev was preparing to launch a military operation against the People’s Republics of Donetsk and Lugansk (DPR and LPR), Peskov said.

It was "hoping that Ukraine will never get prepared for a strike against Donbass," and Moscow was counting on progress in the Normandy Format talks, added the official. 

"After that, in a couple of days, it was perfectly clear for us, <…> for our military specialists, that Ukraine was going to launch an offensive against Donbass," the Spokesperson said, adding that by that time, Ukraine had amassed approximately 120,000 servicemen along the line of contact.

"There were clear signs that an offensive was going to start," Peskov added.

In his words, "no one would listen to our concerns" until the Russian operation began.

"No one would warn Ukrainians not to do that [launch an offensive in Donbass]. No one would push Ukrainians towards the solution within a framework of the Normandy process. No one did," he said.

Russia’s security concerns

Peskov stressed that Western countries have been turning a deaf ear to Russia’s security concerns for decades.

"President Putin’s intents are to make the world listen to and understand our concerns," he said in an interview with CNN. "We've been trying to convey our concerns to the world, first to Europe, to the United States for a couple of decades, but no one would listen to us."

"And before it is too late, it was a decision to start, to launch a special military operation to get rid of anti-Russia that was created next to our border," he stressed.

Russia had launched a special military operation for several reasons, such as NATO's eastward expansion, the Ukrainian shelling of Donbass, and the aggression of Ukrainian forces against the Donetsk People's Republic and Lugansk People's Republic, which has been ongoing since 2014, as well as denazifying and demilitarizing Ukraine.

In response, the United States, the European Union, the United Kingdom, and several other countries announced sanctions against Russian individuals and legal entities.