MOSCOW (Sputnik) – Russia denies it has a large concentration of troops along the Ukrainian border, Russian Deputy Defense Minister Anatoly Antonov said Thursday.
"I know about Victoria Nuland’s announcement <…> of those thousands of apparent Russian military personnel that are on Ukrainian territory. Why not say 12,000? Why are they using such piddly figures: why not say 20,000 or 25,000?” Antonov said.
The deputy defense minister reminded the journalists that Ukraine’s head of the General Staff just recently acknowledged that there are no Russian troops in Ukraine.
Antonov also said that international observers flying over Russian airspace have also not noted any concentration of Russian military personnel along the Ukrainian border.
"There have been 35 fly-overs lately in line with the Open Skies agreement. We haven’t noticed any concentration [of troops], nor the international inspectors," Antonov said.
