You're reading: Putin: Use of armed forces against protesters in Ukraine will have consequences

The use of the armed forces by the Kyiv authorities against their own people will have consequences, Russian President Vladimir Putin said.

“If these people have switched to the so-called hot phase – this is
not some hot phase but simply a punitive operation – it will certainly
have consequences for the people who make such decisions, this also
concerns our intergovernmental relations,” Putin said at a Popular Front
media forum in St. Petersburg on Thursday.

Only the Ukrainian parliament has “some elements of legitimacy,” and
“all other legitimate authorities are in fact not legitimate for these
or those reasons,” he said.

“If the current Kyiv authorities have done this [used troops against
civilians], they are surely some junta or clique,” Putin said