MOSCOW, March 27. /TASS/. New defenses and military posts are being established in the Ukrainian capital of Kiev and the surrounding region, eyewitnesses told TASS.
"They are strengthening defenses all around the city, establishing new posts to station troops," an eyewitness said. A resident of northwestern Kiev, in turn, noted that the old trenches dug in a forested area in that part of the city "were renovated in recent days, cleared of grass and even deepened." "They are also digging new trenches; previously abandoned areas have now become operational. Military personnel are present where wooden constructions used to stand, namely bad weather shelters," he added.
The military has also strengthened control over the Vyshgorod area in the Kiev Region, which is located on the road toward the Belarusian border, with checkpoints everywhere, a local resident said.
Earlier, experts from the Academy of Military Science noted that the United Kingdom had suggested that NATO should send troops to Ukraine and create a buffer zone around Kiev and along the border with Belarus in order to allow more Ukrainian troops to engage in military operations.
French President Emmanuel Macron said on February 26 that some 20 Western countries taking part in a recent Paris meeting on further assistance for Kiev had discussed the possibility of sending troops to Ukraine. According to Macron, no consensus was reached on the issue but such a possibility cannot be ruled out in the future. However, most of the countries that took part in the meeting later stated that they had no plans to send troops to Ukraine and opposed the idea of their participation in military operations against Russia.
Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) Director Sergey Naryshkin, in turn, pointed out that France was already training troops to be sent to Ukraine, the number of which would stand at 2,000 at the initial stage.