On conducting a special military operation

Video of the address by Vladimir Putin (with English captions), which announced the beginning of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. The announcement of the invasion is made at 20:24.

"On conducting a special military operation" (Russian: О проведении специальной военной операции, romanized: O provedenii spetsialʹnoy voyennoy operatsii) was a televised broadcast by Russian president Vladimir Putin on 24 February 2022, announcing the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

It addressed the citizens of Russia and Ukraine, the Armed Forces of Russia and Ukraine, and the international community. Putin announced that Russia was launching a "special military operation" to defend the Russian-controlled territories in eastern Ukraine—the Donetsk People's Republic and Luhansk People's Republic—under Article 51 of the United Nations Charter. Russian elements in the separatist regions had been at war with Ukraine since 2014, and Russia had recently become the first state to recognize them as independent. Putin claimed that Ukraine had been committing genocide against Russian speakers in the region; that Ukraine's government were neo-Nazis under Western control; that Ukraine was developing nuclear weapons; and that NATO was building up military infrastructure in Ukraine, threatening Russia. These allegations were widely rejected as untrue.

Putin said that Russia was acting in self-defense, that its goal was the "demilitarization and denazification" of Ukraine, and claimed that Russia had no plans to occupy Ukrainian land. He threatened severe consequences for any country that intervened. The invasion began immediately after Putin's announcement.