NEW YORK, February 4. /TASS/. Russia has never engaged in provocations, such as alleged making of a video to serve as a pretext for an invasion of Ukraine, reported by the United States, Russian Permanent Representative to the European Union Vladimir Chizhov has told CNN in an interview.
"It's something similar to false flag operations conducted by Western countries and certain quasi NGOs in Syria some time ago, with alleged chemical attacks allegedly by the Syrian government, but in essence by their opponents. So I can assure you that Russia is never involved in any business of this kind. And no reason, logically speaking, that that might be taking place," he said.
A number of US media reported on Thursday, citing unnamed US administration officials, that Russia had allegedly fabricated a video of Ukrainian government forces attacking civilians in Russia or self-proclaimed people’s republics of Donetsk and Lugansk (DPR and LPR), in order to obtain a pretext for attacking Ukraine. This information was later confirmed by the Department of Defense.
Commenting on the reports, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday it was not for the first time have materials about Russia’s plans to "invade" Ukraine been published in the US, but nothing has followed afterwards.
Concerns over Moscow’s alleged preparations for an invasion into Ukraine have been increasingly announced in the west and in Kiev recently. Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov castigated these statements as an empty and groundless escalation of tension, emphasizing that Russia posed no threat to anyone. At the same time, the Kremlin press secretary did not exclude some possible provocations to justify such claims and warned that the attempts to resolve the Ukrainian conflict by force would carry extremely serious consequences.