Ukraine rejects invasion claims

Ukraine does not believe that Russia is planning to launch a full-scale invasion, despite claims from Western officials that an offensive is imminent, the secretary of Kiev’s National Security and Defense Council said on Thursday.

Speaking to TV channel 1+1, Alexey Danilov stated that Kiev had not picked up any signs that a military incursion was approaching.

“If we are talking about a full-scale operation against our state, then we don’t see that,” Danilov insisted.

Despite what he called Russian “provocations” in east Ukraine, he also stressed that Kiev must not succumb to what he sees as Moscow’s attempts to arouse a reaction.

“The purpose [of the provocations] is to make us respond powerfully in order to accuse us of something we are not going to do,” he stressed.

Danilov’s claims follow similar ones he made earlier this week, when he dismissed Western allegations that Russia was gearing up for a full-scale invasion to be launched on Wednesday or Thursday. Both days passed without incident.

“The situation is absolutely under control,” the defense official said on Monday, following a private meeting of Ukrainian MPs. “As of today, we do not see that a large-scale attack by Russia can take place either on the 16th or the 17th.”

Danilov’s insistence that Russia will not launch a full-scale invasion was also supported by Alexander Pavliuk, Commander-in-Chief of the Joint Forces Operation of Ukraine in the Donbass.

“We do not see the likelihood of a full-scale invasion of Ukraine now,” Pavliuk told television channel TSN on Thursday, stressing, however, that the region remains tense and soldiers remain in constant combat readiness.

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