Russian Minister of Defence Sergey Shoygu speaking during a Security Council meeting in Moscow on February 21. Russian Government Media
Vladimir Putin convened an unscheduled meeting of Russia's Security Council on Monday.
The Kremlin said the meeting was prerecorded, after a minister's watch showed a different time.
Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin's press secretary, said recording meetings in advance wasn't unusual.
The Kremlin said a dramatic Security Council meeting on Ukraine was recorded in advance, after people realized a minister's watch showed the wrong time.
Amid rising tensions with Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin convened an unscheduled meeting with his country's top security officials at the Grand Kremlin Palace in Moscow on Monday.
The meeting was broadcast at 5 p.m. Moscow time, but a watch on the wrist of Russian Minister of Defence Sergey Shoygu — who spoke 47 minutes into the meeting — showed it was 12:47 p.m. instead, prompting speculation about whether the meeting was live or recorded.
Although the meeting was announced unexpectedly, the Kremlin didn't specify whether it was live.
Dmitry Peskov, the Kremlin's press secretary, confirmed on Tuesday that the meeting was recorded in advance and that "certain nuances were not broadcast," the state-run RIA news agency reported.
He insisted that prerecording meetings wasn't unusual.
Hours after the meeting, Putin delivered a speech in which he announced that Russia would recognize two separatist regions — the Donetsk People's Republic and the Luhansk People's Republic — as independent states.
Late on Monday, Russia ordered troops into those regions, saying it did so for peacekeeping reasons.
The move drew swift condemnation from the West. The White House announced sanctions on the regions shortly after, and the UK confirmed on Tuesday that it would launch a "first barrage" of sanctions against Russia. Germany also said it would scrap plans for the Nord Stream II gas pipeline.
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CactusBoyScout on February 22nd, 2022 at 21:26 UTC »
There was a similar scandal when someone higher up in the Russian Orthodox Church was photographed wearing a Rolex that costs more than most Russians' annual income.
The church released the photo with the Rolex photoshopped out but you could still see it in the reflection of the table he was sitting at, lol.
Wacky_Water_Weasel on February 22nd, 2022 at 19:04 UTC »
I'm honestly shocked they didn't tell the rest of the world their clocks were wrong.
Havvocck2 on February 22nd, 2022 at 17:14 UTC »
It's offbeat because you'd like to think that something so important was decided upon after the meeting, not before. So, the invasion meeting was per-recorded like some late night talk-show? How sick is that?