MOSCOW, March 6. /TASS/. Evidence of a US-financed military biological program developed in Ukraine has been revealed during Russia’s special operation in that country, Russian Defense Ministry Spokesman Igor Konashenkov said on Sunday.

"In the course of the special military operation, evidence of the Kiev regime’s hasty measures to conceal any traces of the military biological program finance by the US Department of Defense in Ukraine has been revealed," he said.

According to the spokesman, information was received from employees of Ukrainian biolaboratories that especially hazardous pathogens: plague, anthrax, cholera, tularemia and other lethal diseases infecting agents had been urgently destroyed on February 24.

According to Konashenkov, following the beginning of Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine, the Ukrainian health ministry issued an instruction to all biolaboratories to urgently destroy hazardous pathogens they had.

"Obviously, after the launch of the special military operations, Pentagon became afraid that secret biological experiments in Ukraine will be exposed. We will share the results of the analysis of the documents we have received in the near future. Some of them, in particular the Ukrainian health ministry’s instruction to destroy pathogens and certificates of completion from the Kharkov and Poltava biolaboratories we are publishing right now," he said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said in a televised address on February 24 that in response to a request by the heads of the Donbass republics he had made a decision to carry out a special military operation in order to protect people "who have been suffering from abuse and genocide by the Kiev regime for eight years." The Russian leader stressed that Moscow had no plans of occupying Ukrainian territories.

When clarifying the unfolding developments, the Russian Defense Ministry reassured that Russian troops are not targeting Ukrainian cities, but are limited to surgically striking and incapacitating Ukrainian military infrastructure. There are no threats whatsoever to the civilian population.