MOSCOW, September 16. /TASS/. The United States is only formalizing its involvement in the conflict by discussing whether Ukraine should be allowed to attack Russian territory with Western weapons, but American specialists have been involved in Ukraine for a long time, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters.

"There is the actual side of the case and there is the formalization of the actual side of the case. We see a lot of information fiddling around this, a lot of rumors, a lot of predictions by different analysts," he said.

However, according to Peskov, no official statements on the matter have yet been heard. "We have repeatedly said that American specialists, servicemen and so on are taking part in the conflict without these authorizations. This is still happening. But as for formalization - there was an absolutely clear statement by the Russian president on this matter, where everything was very clearly stated," the Kremlin spokesman emphasized.

Earlier, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the discussion on this topic was nothing but a substitution of concepts. He pointed out that NATO countries were not just discussing Kiev's possible use of Western long-range weapons: in fact, they were deciding whether to get directly involved in the Ukrainian conflict or not.