Russian President Vladimir Putin said Thursday that the deadly bombings targeting Ukraine's power grid, which led to massive power outages, followed the Kremlin's goal of “demilitarizing Ukraine.”
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The Russian President said, during a meeting in the Kremlin with his Belarusian counterpart Alexander Lukashenko: “We assume that in this way we will have influence on the military-industrial complex in Ukraine.”
Meanwhile, Putin said the bombings were a response to recent Ukrainian attacks targeting Russia's energy infrastructure, including refineries.
“We have seen a series of strikes on our energy sites recently and have had to respond,” he said.
Putin also confirmed that the Russian military did not strike Ukrainian electrical installations this winter for “humanitarian reasons.” “We did not want to deprive social infrastructure, hospitals and other electricity,” the Russian president said.
During the winter of 2022-2023, Russian strikes left thousands of people in the cold and dark for long periods.
This winter, the Ukrainian electricity grid was less targeted until March and the start of a new wave of bombings targeting it.
On Thursday, once again, some forty missiles and several Russian drones targeted the Ukrainian power grid, so much so that President Volodymyr Zelensky appealed to his Western allies to equip his country with anti-aircraft defense systems as soon as possible.
