'Disturbing' Russian troop activity in eastern Ukraine
PR dla Zagranicy
Peter Gentle
13.11.2014 08:57
Poland's defence minister has expressed concern over NATO reports that Russian troops and military equipment have re-entered eastern Ukraine to assist separatist forces there.
A Ukrainian serviceman from an anti-terrorist unit during a training session on a shooting range not far from Kharkiv, Ukraine, 12 November 2014. NATO has seen columns of Russian tanks, artillery and air defence systems and Russian combat troops entering into Ukraine, NATO's supreme allied commander Europe, General Philip Breedlove, said in Sofia: photo - EPA/SERGEI KOZLOV
“We are following what is going on in eastern Ukraine and it is very disturbing,” Tomasz Siemoniak told the TVN24 broadcaster on Tuesday night as new NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg urged Russia to pull back its forces.
The reports of Russian troops crossing the borer into Ukraine comes amid heavy artillery fire in the city of Donetsk and reports of fighting near Luhansk.
“This may mean that the conflict has re-entered an acute stage,” Minister Siemoniak said, adding that “a large part of Ukraine's border is in control of separatists”.
US general Philip Breedlove, NATO's supreme allied commander Europe, said on Wednesday.: “What worries me the most is that we have a situation now that the former international border between Ukraine and Russia is completely porous, it is completely wide open.”
Russian Defence Ministry official General-Major Igor Konashenkov denied that Russia had re-entered Ukraine. “There were and are no facts” behind such statements, he said in Moscow. (pg)