Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on Sunday rejected Moscow’s accusations that Kyiv was preparing provocations using a “dirty bomb”, as the Russian Defense Minister claimed in telephone interviews with NATO countries.
“If Russia calls and says that Ukraine is preparing something, it means only one thing: Russia has already prepared all this. I think that now the world must react as harshly as possible,” Volodymyr Zelensky said on social media.
If Russia has prepared “a new stage in the escalation, it must see now, preemptively and in the face of one of its new ‘dirts’, that the world will not accept it,” he continued.
“absurd” accusations
Volodymyr Zelensky judged that the Russian threat to use nuclear weapons, “and even more so against our country that has given up its nuclear arsenal (…) is a reason both for sanctions and for increasing support for Ukraine.”
Earlier in the day, Ukraine’s Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said on social media that “Russian fabrications about Ukraine preparing to use a ‘dirty bomb’ are both absurd and dangerous.”
“Russians often blame others for what they themselves are doing,” he added.
In talks with his British, French and Turkish counterparts on Sunday, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu expressed “concerns about possible provocations by Ukraine with the use of a ‘dirty bomb,'” according to a press release from his services.
Source: BFM TV
