A TV presenter on Russia Today, funded by the Russian government, stared into the camera for a 90-second tirade against President Putin’s actions on Monday.

At the end of her show, U.S.-based Abby Martin said she “wanted to say something from my heart about the ongoing political crisis in Ukraine and Russia’s military occupation of Crimea.”

Admitting that her knowledge of the subtle political dynamics of Ukraine and Crimea were not up to scratch, she nevertheless declared Russia to be in the wrong.

Seen as the arm of Russia’s foreign “soft policy,” Russia Today, or RT, has been running since 2005 and broadcasts to 100 countries.

In her monologue, Martin said: “Just because I work here, for RT, doesn’t mean I don’t have editorial independence and I can’t stress enough how strongly I am against any military intervention in sovereign nations’ affairs.

“What Russia did is wrong.”

She added: “Military intervention is never the answer. I will not sit here and apologize for or defend military action.”

She then condemned international media, saying coverage of the crisis in Ukraine had been “disappointing…and rife with misinformation.”

The Ukrainian people have become “pawns in a global power chess game,” she said.

She added: “All we can do now is hope for a peaceful outcome for a terrible situation and prevent another full-blown Cold War between multiple superpowers.

Since the broadcast, Martin has made no public comment on the incident. She did, however, re-tweet a post by another user which said: “I put my heart and my soul into my work, and have lost my mind in the process.”

Last Update: Wednesday, 20 May 2020 KSA 09:41 - GMT 06:41