WASHINGTON, March 7. /TASS/. The US Department of Defense remained tight-lipped on the statement by the Russian Defense Ministry that the Ukrainian Security Service and the militants of the Azov battalion plan to blow up the reactor at the National Research Center of the Kharkov Institute of Physics and Technology and accuse the Russian Armed Forces of launching a missile attack on an experimental nuclear system.

"I don’t have any to offer to the allegations or comments you stated below," the representative of the US military department said on Sunday responding to TASS’ request to comment on the statement made by the Russian Defense Ministry.

Earlier, the ministry said that "the Security Forces of Ukraine along with the militants of the Azov battalion are plotting a provocation with possible radioactive contamination of the area near the city of Kharkov." The statement noted that "nationalists mined a reactor at an experimental nuclear system located at the [National Research Center of] Kharkov Institute of Physics and Technology." "The Ukrainian military and the Azov battalion militants are planning to blow up the reactor and accuse the Russian Armed Forces of allegedly launching a missile strike on an experimental nuclear system," the Russian defense ministry stressed.

The Russian Defense Ministry noted that "on March 6, foreign journalists arrived in Kharkov to register the consequences of the provocation, followed by accusing Russia of creating an environmental disaster.".