“There was a war going on and people went there to fight, to shoot, and to participate in combat…that’s the military sphere,” Peskov told journalists in response of what the Russian president had in mind when he was speaking about military issues during his annual press conference on December 17.
When journalists asked Peskov to be more precise of what Putin was speaking about when discussing the military in eastern Ukraine that he meant Russian volunteers had been there and not regular military troops, Peskov said, “Yes.”
“That’s completely incorrect,” Peskov said in regard to Stoltenberg’s interpretation of Putin’s statement.
On Thursday, Putin said Moscow had never said that there were no people resolving military issues in Ukraine, but that does not mean that there are Russian troops permanently stationed there.
We never said that there were no people who task themselves with solving certain issues, including in the military sphere, but that does not mean that there are regular Russian troops there. Feel the difference," Putin explained at his annual press conference.
