After Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine entered its second week on 3 March, Russian President Vladimir Putin held another meeting with the Security Council members to say that the operation was going according to plan and all tasks were being implemented successfully.

Putin repeatedly stressed that the Russian army was doing everything possible to prevent civilian casualties and was targeting only military infrastructure.

On 24 February Russia started a special military operation in Ukraine to protect civilians in the Donbass People’s Republics of Donetsk and Lugansk, whose authorities appealed to Moscow for assistance following repeated shelling of their territories by Ukrainian forces. President Putin explained that a key goal of the operation is to “demilitarize and de-Nazify” Ukraine and thus eliminate a threat to Russia’s national security.

On Thursday, Russian and Ukrainian delegations held a second round of talks in Belarus which resulted in an agreement to jointly organize humanitarian corridors to ensure evacuation of civilians and deliveries of food and medicines. Also, the sides agreed to continue negotiations as soon as possible.