What time is Vladimir Putin’s speech today?

Russian leader gives address on Ukraine war as conflict approaches first anniversary

Vladimir Putin is making a major State of the Nation address to members of both houses of the Russian parliament in Moscow on Tuesday, just days before the war in Ukraine marks its first anniversary.

Mr Putin will speak to Russia’s political and military elite on the Ukraine conflict and also share an analysis of the international situation more generally, as he sees it.

The Russian president will also outline his vision for his country’s development against the backdrop of sweeping sanctions imposed by the West on its oligarchs, businessmen and major firms, the Kremlin said.

It comes just hours after US president Joe Biden walked the streets of Kyiv in the company of Volodymyr Zelensky, warning Mr Putin he had been “dead wrong” in his assessment of how an invasion of Ukraine would turn out.

The speech is due to begin at 9am GMT in central Moscow and you can follow all the latest updates on The Independent’s liveblog and watch it live on our YouTube channel.

Mr Putin traditionally addresses a large audience of lawmakers and state officials and the speech will be broadcast by all Russian state TV channels.

While the Constitution mandates that the president deliver the speech annually, Mr Putin did not give one in 2022, as his troops rolled into Ukraine and suffered repeated setbacks, prompting him to cancel it in December. Now the address comes days before the war’s first anniversary on Friday.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said that the Russian leader will focus on the “special military operation” in Ukraine, as Moscow calls it, and Russia's economy and social issues. Many observers also expect the speech to address Moscow’s fallout with the West.

Underscoring the anticipation, some state TV channels put out a countdown for the event starting on Monday and Russia’s state news agency RIA Novosti on Tuesday morning said the address may be “historic”.

Vladimir Putin (Sputnik/AFP/Getty)

The Kremlin this year has barred media from “unfriendly” countries, the list of which includes the US, the UK and those in the EU. Mr Peskov said journalists from those nations will be able to cover the speech by watching the broadcast.

Senior Russian lawmaker and leader of the nationalist LDPR party Leonid Slutsky was quoted by RIA Novosti as saying that Mr Putin will set priorities “that will deprive our enemies of the hope to defeat Russia, weaken it or try to subdue it to their neo-colonial leadership”.

Political analyst Tatyana Stanovaya said the address “was expected to be very hawkish, aimed at defiantly breaking off relations with the West”. In the wake of Mr Biden’s visit to Kyiv “additional edits can be made to make it even harsher”.

Mr Peskov told reporters that the speech’s delay had to do with Mr Putin’s “work schedule” but Russian media reports linked it to the multiple setbacks Russian forces have suffered on the battlefield in Ukraine.

The Russian president had postponed the State of the Nation address once before: in 2017, the speech was rescheduled for early 2018.

Last year, the Kremlin has also canceled two other big annual events — Mr Putin's press conference and a highly scripted phone-in marathon where people ask the president questions.

Additional reporting by agencies