07 dic Russia denies american concerns about Ukraine as smokescreen
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov keeps a joint reports seminar with his Lebanese counterpart Abdallah Bou Habib in Moscow, Russia, Monday (Evgenia Novozhenina/ Pool pic via AP)
MOSCOW – The Kremlin on Monday strongly rejected the U.S. boasts of a Russian troop buildup near Ukraine, claiming it may be a ruse intended to cover up what it called Ukrainian leadership's intense objectives.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov ignored U.S. media accusations of Moscow's supposed intentions to invade Ukraine as an element of effort to discredit Russia. He insisted that troop movements on Russia's very own territory should never point anyone.
Ukraine complained earlier in the day this month that Russia has held tens and thousands of troops not definately not the two region’ edges after performing combat video games in an attempt to additional force their ex-Soviet neighbors. Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014 and has recognized a separatist insurgency that broke away that 12 months in eastern Ukraine.
Speaking-to Ukraine’s overseas minister this period, assistant of county Antony Blinken noted that Russia's “playbook” was to build causes near the edge and then occupy, “claiming wrongly that it was provoked.”
