MOSCOW, April 24. /TASS/. Ukraine violated the Easter truce 4,900 times in 30 hours, Russian Security Council Secretary Sergey Shoigu told TASS.
"The 30-hour Easter truce that was declared by Russia was never observed by the Ukrainian side a single hour: 4,900 violations, including 1,400 artillery shelling attacks, 90 attempted drone attacks, six attacks," he said. "In fairness I would note that we observed an overall reduction of the enemy’s combat activities."
He recalled that the NATO and EU leadership had said that they were ready to confront Russia, regardless of the outcome of the conflict in Ukraine. "After a NATO ministerial meeting on April 4, 2025, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte stated that the alliance will continue weapons supplies to Ukraine and sharing intelligence data with it. Apart from that, in his words, Russia will remain a threat to NATO even if the Ukrainian conflict is ended," Shoigu noted.
According to him, the European Union’s leadership is seeking to turn the organization into a military bloc opposing Russia. "With an objective of rearming Europe, they announced a program for the development of the European defense industry worth 800 billion euro. We see the Europeans’ attempts to create their own air defense system. Europe is looking at deploying 120 fighter jets in Ukraine that would operate under the European command independently from NATO," he added.