asked me to call on the leaders of the world to speak clearly against the fragment aggression and to stand with the people of ukraine. tomorrow i will be meeting with the leaders of the g7 and the united states. imposing severe shanks on russia. that statement there, making explicit, it was implied by the earlier white house statements tonight, that the president will be as promised, escalating beyond the sanctions that he announced just 31 hours ago. we ve been hearing all along, this is now three months in which the white house has been promising swift and severe sanctions on russia if it were to go ahead with the invasion. at the earliest indications of that invasion, a little over 24 hours ago, they took that initial step, banking sanctions on russian all the guards, the severing of nord stream 2 essentially. now essentially, the white house and president saying in the statement, that they will indeed go further. now that vladimir putin has gone further.
0 official, i asked him if president putin is directing this himself. and he said yes, that is how it is going. that is not surprising. we know that president putin makes all of the decisions. in the end, he will have had advice from that small clique around him, that ultimately he is the decision-maker. and another element of his televised address, which to reiterate, if russians will be stunned by. waking up and seeing now, another man from that televised address, which is chilling frankly. is that president putin requires russian s nuclear capability. and clearly, openly threatens western leaders. even after the collapse of the ussr, losing a significant part of the nuclear potential. today, russia is one of the most nuclear powers. and he says, i think that this is a direct message to the west. in this regard, no one should have any doubt that a direct attack on russia will lead to defeat and dire consequences for a potential aggressor. and so, i just want to say all, just before t