New Delhi: The President of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, on rising tension with Russia, said that “Ukraine had ‘no need’ for foreign allied forces to face down a feared Russian invasion, their presence might only exacerbate tensions,”
Zelensky said, “We have ‘no need’ for soldiers with foreign flags on our territory. We are not asking for that. Otherwise, the entire world would be destabilized.”
Russia has repeatedly denied it is planning an invasion of Ukraine and repeated on Thursday that it is not planning any attack, But US President Joe Biden warned that the threat of Russian invasion was very high.
The US on one side says, “Moscow has continued building up its forces and combat readiness along the border with its Eastern European neighbor,” while Kremlin says, “Moscow pulling back its troops.”
The official also said the US was concerned by the recent shelling in the Donbass region of eastern Ukraine and cited what Washington says are preparations to fabricate a pretext for invasion, an accusation echoed by Nato.
Britain took the accusation one step further on Thursday, with Prime Minister Boris Johnson declaring that the shelling of a kindergarten in eastern Ukraine was “a false flag operation designed to discredit the Ukrainians, designed to create a pretext, a spurious provocation for Russian action.”
“We fear very much that is the kind of thing we will see more of over the next few days. The picture is continuing to be very grim,” he added. His assertion came after Kyiv and Moscow traded allegations over intensified fighting involving Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine, with the US government also warning that Russia appeared to be moving towards an invasion.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin warned again in Brussels that Russia could be seeking an excuse to invade. “We have said for some time that the Russians might do something like this in order to justify a military conflict. So we will be watching this very closely.”
(_Vinayak)