MOSCOW, April 9. /TASS/. French President Emmanuel Macron is playing with fire by talking about the potential deployment of troops in Ukraine, Alexey Polishchuk, director of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Second CIS Department, told TASS in an interview.

"Such conversations cannot but cause concern. Politicians who are calling for a military intervention in Ukraine are playing with fire," the diplomat said, commenting on the French leader’s remarks on the matter.

According to him, many Western politicians are sacrificing the national interests of their own countries for the sake of a political agenda and election ambitions. "There is an impression that they do not realize the risks of the crisis escalating and spreading. This is political immaturity. Our warnings about the consequences of flooding the Kiev regime with weapons are being ignored," Polishchuk stressed.

Earlier, Macron said that some 20 Western countries taking part in a recent Paris meeting on further assistance for Kiev had discussed the possibility of sending ground troops to Ukraine. According to the French leader, no consensus was reached on the issue but such a possibility cannot be ruled out in the future.