Moscow : Russia is concerned with arrival of US military personnel on Ukraine soil, the Russian Foreign Ministry has said.
“Up to 300 US troops reportedly have been deployed to a peacekeeping center in Ukraine’s western Lvov region,” the ministry spokesman Alexander Lukashevich on Thursday, Xinhua reported.
Noting that those US military instructors would train Ukrainian soldiers from March 5 to October 21 on western military hardware operations, Lukashevich said that US military presence in that country has become a fact.
He also highlighted danger of US plans to start massive arms supply to Ukraine despite successful implementation of the ceasefire agreement reached in Minsk, the Belarusian national capital, on February 12 between Ukrainian government and Donbass insurgents in eastern Ukraine.
Moreover, the US Congress has been drafting a bill on allocating one billion US dollars for Ukraine’s army training and armament equipment, according to Lukashevich,
“It seems like Washington decided to take (Ukrainian armed forces) under full maintenance,” Interfax news agency quoted Lukashevich as saying.
Meanwhile, the spokesman blamed the US for its military presence in the Black Sea, as NATO Maritime Command said Wednesday in an online announcement that six NATO warships had arrived in the Black Sea for joint exercises.
“This somehow contradicts the public statements of the US administration supporting political settlement of conflict in Ukraine,” Lukashevich said.
He warned that such actions might lead to “the most serious consequences” for the peaceful settlement of the crisis.
Lukashevich also urged the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe monitoring mission in Ukraine to verify implementation of Minsk agreements, especially to monitor the weapon withdrawal by conflicting parties in the “impartial, well- organised and systemic way.”