Putin’s panicking puppet pleads with Russians not to overthrow him | World | News
Putin is coming under huge pressure in Russia (Image: Getty)
Russians have been issued an panicky warning against seeking to overthrow Vladimir Putin as Ukraine overnight staged dramatic new strikes to cripple his economy. A drone onslaught took out two giant Kremlin energy complexes in Nizhnekamsk and Saratov, both engulfed by infernos.
A military airfield was ablaze at Borisoglebsk in Voronezh region. It was confirmed the country’s largest refinery in Omsk, Siberia is the latest to totally stop production following an audacious long-range attack this week. Shortages of petrol and diesel are paralysing Russia with gargantuan queues at filling stations where prices are spiralling, and Putin losing his grip on annexed Black Sea peninsula Crimea, with 360 more fuel trucks and heavy transport supply vehicles were hit by drones in the past week. This came as NATO leaders were meeting in Ankara today to coordinate assistance for Ukraine in resisting Putin’s illegal invasion.
People queue to refuel their cars at a Lukoil gas station (Image: AFP via Getty Images)
Amid acute setbacks in the war, the Kremlin sent out Putin’s RT propaganda chief Margarita Simonyan to admit Russians faced real hardships due to the endless war – but to demand they stop moaning and caution them against seeking to topple Putin as they did the last tsar Nicholas II in 1917.
“There is no petrol,” she bluntly acknowledged on state TV viewers. “Well, I still remember, my generation remembers, how food was actually rationed…..in 1992…We endured it. And we will endure it now.
“I have no doubts at all that [the enemy] do all of this so that we, like in 1917, run off to overthrow the dear Tsar, and then make such a mess of things ….”
Simonyan, editor-in-chief of the RT media empire, warned: “I do not think this is that kind of time for us now. So I urge everyone: be calmer, stay calm. Yes, it is hard, yes, very hard. Be calmer about holding parties, too. This is not the time.”
She failed to mention the million-plus Russians killed or maimed by Putin’s failing war.
At the same time, Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov made clear when the dictator could use nuclear weapons.
RT chief Margarita Simonyan speaks on Russian state TV about wartime hardships and support for Putin (Image: AFP via Getty Images)
“If there is something threatening the very existence of the Russian state, nuclear arms will be used,” he said. “Otherwise, no. It is very important to understand this.”
He told Swiss TV that Russia was “quite capable of continuing the operation and achieving results that are successful for us without it [using nuclear arms]. And we are doing that.”
Ukraine should surrender to Russia’s demands on sacrificing territory “and the next day, the war will end,” he said.
Ukraine’s strikes hit the Nizhnekamskneftekhim petrochemical plant at Nizhnekamsk, in Tatarstan, with the column of smoke visible from miles away in neighbouring cities. Saratov oil refinery was also hit, with one person killed.
Ukraine also struck key Gazprom compressor station in Krasnodar region, which is pumping gas to Turkey via Blue Stream.
RT chief Margarita Simonyan warned Russians not to repeat the overthrow of Tsar Nicholas II in 1917 (Image: Getty)
This came as the energy behemoth’s stock has fallen to its loewest level for 17 years amid Russian concerns for its future.
The Borisoglebsk airfield is a base for Su-34, Su-35S, and Su-30SM aircraft, used in the war against Ukraine. Two more tankers sailing to Rostov-on-Don were hit by drone attacks.
Earlier Russia staged strikes on Kyiv in a bid to hit the makers of FP-5 Flamingo cruise missiles, as well as long and medium range drones.
The Kyiv mayor Vitali Klitschko said “In the Desnyanskyi district, storage facilities are on fire as a result of a missile strike.
“In the Sviatoshynskyi district, there’s a fire in a non-residential building.”
