Washington’s continued support for Kiev during Moscow’s military operation has put the US on the verge of becoming party to the Ukrainian conflict, Russia’s deputy Foreign Minister, Sergey Ryabkov has said.
“We don’t want escalation. We’d like to avoid a situation, in which the US becomes a party to the conflict, but so far we don’t see any readiness of the other side to take these warnings seriously,” Ryabkov told Rossiya 1 TV channel on Friday.
Moscow rejects Washington’s explanation, that providing Ukraine with weapons and other aid is justified by Kiev’s right to self-defense, he pointed out.
“Excuse me, what kind of self-defense is it if they are already openly talking about the possibility of attacking targets deep in the Russian territory, in Crimea?” the deputy FM wondered.
According to Ryabkov, such statements are being made by the Ukrainian side “not just under the blind eye of the US and NATO, but with the encouragement of this kind of sentiment, approaches, plans and ideas directly from Washington,” Ryabkov insisted.