Russia warns West of dire consequences of its ‘provocations’ over Ukraine

The Kremlin strongly warns the West against keeping up its daily predictions of a “Russian invasion” of Ukraine, cautioning that they might lead to dire consequences.

According to Press TV, speaking on Sunday, Kremlin Spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said such predictions were provocative.

Most recently, US President Joe Biden said he was "convinced" that his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin planned to carry out such an invasion within days, and NATO Chief Jens Stoltenberg warned that everything indicated Russia was preparing a "full-fledged attack."

"The fact is that this directly leads to an increase in tension. And when tension is escalated to the maximum, as it is now, for example, on the line of contact (in eastern Ukraine), then any spark, any unplanned incident or any minor planned provocation can lead to irreparable consequences," Peskov said.

"So all this has - may have - detrimental consequences. The daily exercise of announcing a date for Russia to invade Ukraine is a very bad practice," the spokesman added.

Peskov also noted that Putin took no notice of such Western statements.

In order to make their statement sound reasonable, the Western officials and media outlets have been citing Russia’s deployment of big detachments of troops along its border with Ukraine. Russia says the deployment is defensive in nature and that it has the right to move its troops about inside its own territory.

The West has, however, refused to tone down the speculations even as some Russian troops have returned to their permanent deployment bases after drills.

Earlier on Sunday, Russia’s Ambassador to the US, Anatoly Antonov, likewise asserted that Moscow had no plans to invade Ukraine, adding that Russian troops were stationed on the country's sovereign territory and "are not threatening anyone."

Even, Ukraine's Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov called it “inappropriate” to talk about a “Russian invasion” in the coming days.

"Today, as of this hour, Russia has not formed yet a strike force in any city where it surrounded Ukraine," Reznikov told Ukraine's 1+1 broadcaster.

Also on Sunday, Putin told his French counterpart Emanuel Macron during a telephone conversation that the West was yet to respond to Russia’s “security guarantees demands” substantively, Russia’s ITAR-TASS news agency reported.

Moscow presented the proposals last December.

ME