Oleksandr Turchynov: If no full-scale military aggression is unleashed, martial law will not be prolonged

This was emphasized by Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council of Ukraine Oleksandr Turchynov in an interview with BBC News Ukraine.

"There were many speculations in the Russian media, in the Ukrainian as well, especially in the one that still focuses on the aggressor country, that this is an attempt to undermine elections, that it's politics, not a security issue. The answer is very simple here - the election process will begin in January as it was to begin, - Mr. Turchynov said. - From the outset, the President has clearly said that elections will be held in due time, and that martial law will not be prolonged unless there is full-scale military aggression".

Oleksandr Turchynov also noticed that martial law in effect differs significantly from its classical form, in particular, there was no restriction on the rights and freedoms of citizens: "We have gone through these restrictions without even preventive detention of fear-mongers and saboteurs".

The NSDC Secretary noted that martial law had been imposed because of an act of direct military aggression of the Russian Federation. "When demonstrative military aggression was unleashed, we could not rule out that Russia would not stop at that point. In such circumstances, it is necessary to make quick decisions and act, because the military machine, like the country's entire power bloc, has rather high inertia", - he stressed.

According to the NSDC Secretary, martial law has become a "stress test, global examination of the country, the extent to which it is ready to mobilize all its resources: power, economic, human, in order to counteract full-scale aggression". "In general, the country is ready to counteract aggression, but many problems to be corrected urgently have also been revealed", - he concluded.