Putin Describes The Moment He Gave Secret Order To Invade Crimea

In a trailer for a new documentary, the Russian president described an all-night meeting in which he gave the directive to "return Crimea to Russia," four days before Russian troops appeared in the region.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has revealed that he gave the order to enact the controversial takeover of Crimea during an all-night meeting four days before troops appeared on the peninsula, a new documentary has revealed.

In a trailer for journalist Andrei Kondrashov's forthcoming documentary for the state-run Rossiya 1 channel — translated here by The Telegraph — Putin described an all-night meeting held on Feb. 22, 2014, during which he discussed a plan to save Ukraine's then-recently deposed, pro-Kremlin President Viktor Yanukovych.

Putin said he instructed security chiefs to extract Yanukovych from Donetsk during a lengthy meeting finished around 7 a.m. local time on Feb. 23, 2014. Yanukovych was ousted after violent street protests in Kiev.

Putin insisted that Yanukovych would have been "destroyed" without Moscow's help.

He added: "We got ready to get him right out of Donetsk by land, by sea, or by air. Heavy machine guns were mounted there to avoid talking too much."

Yanukovych ended up in Rostov-on-Don, in southern Russia, after the operation. He has yet to return to Ukraine.

Putin's order to invade came at the end of that all-night meeting.

Four days after the now-revealed meeting, armed men without insignia began appearing at strategic points around Crimea.

Russia initially denied the troops — then described as "little green men" — were Russian soldiers, instead insisting they were volunteers. The Crimean parliament was seized on March 16, and two days later Putin signed a bill on the peninsula's annexation.

The annexation was widely condemned by the international community.

Since then, more than 6,000 people have died in fighting in eastern Ukraine between Ukrainian government troops and pro-Russian rebels. Western governments have insisted Russia is backing the rebels, although this is denied by the Kremlin.

The trailer for the documentary, Crimea: Road to the Motherland, with translations by The Telegraph, can be seen here.

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