Russian Defense Ministry Denies Reports Military Column Crossed into Ukraine
TEHRAN (Tasnim) - Russia’s Defense Ministry denied Kiev’s report that it “destroyed the Russian military column” which allegedly crossed into Ukraine, saying that no such column ever existed.
“No Russian military column that allegedly crossed the Russian-Ukrainian border at night or during the day ever existed,” said Major General Igor Konashenkov, a spokesman for the Russian Defense Ministry, RT reported.
The best scenario would be, the official said, if it was a “phantom” that the Ukrainian military destroyed “rather than refugees or their own servicemen.”
“Such statements – based on fantasies, or journalists’ assumptions, to be precise – should not be subject for a serious discussion by top officials of any country,” Konashenkov said.
The Defense Ministry’s comment comes shortly after Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko announced that his country’s artillery had destroyed a “significant” number of Russian military vehicles that allegedly crossed into Ukraine on Thursday night. Reports of the alleged incident had appeared in several Ukrainian and Western media outlets.
Earlier on Friday Russia’s Security Service (FSB) also denied the reports. Border guards have been deployed to provide security near the frontier, but they operate only on the Russian side, the FSB said.
The mobile military teams “operate strictly within the territory of the Russian Federation,” a spokesperson for the FSB Border Guard Service in Rostov region told RT on Friday.
Russia has stepped up security measures on its border with Ukraine as local residents are under constant threat because of “regular cross-border shelling” and an increased number of “mass border crossings” by the Ukrainian military, he explained. For that reason, FSB mobile border guards’ teams have been created.