Maria Zakharova, an official spokesperson for Russia's Foreign Ministry, said that Ukraine deployed a half of its army to the conflict zone in Donbass, RIA Novosti reports.
"The Armed Forces of Ukraine have been building up their military strength. Reportedly, as many as 125,000 troops have been deployed in the conflict zone, and, if anyone does not know, this accounts for a half of the entire strength of the Armed Forces of Ukraine,” Zakharova said at a briefing on Wednesday, December 1.
In November, the head of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the Ministry of Defense of Ukraine, Kirill Budanov, said that Russia was planning to attack Ukraine in late January or early February, and deployed more than 92,000 troops on the border for the purpose.
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said that any aggression against Ukraine would entail political and economic consequences for Russia.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that Moscow was not harbouring any aggressive plans with regard to Ukraine.
"It is absolutely incorrect to associate any movements of the Russian Armed Forces across the territory of our country with such plans,” he stressed.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova also said that the remarks from former British Chief of the Defence Staff, Nick Carter, about the Russian threat were outrageous and vague.
"It can be concluded that the general message from the British military official is to re-present our country as a key factor that is allegedly pushing London to increase the modernization of its own military power,” Zakharova said. In her opinion, the UK is hiding behind imaginary threats from Russia to justify an increase in military spending.
Zakharova also said that the Russian Foreign Ministry deals with negotiations and peacekeeping efforts, rather than conflicts.
"Therefore, if someone in Britain is annoyed at this point, it seems to me that they should rather deal with their own political actors, both domestically and abroad,” she added.
In his interview with The Telegraph, General Carter, who stepped down as Chief of the Defence Staff on November 27, 2021, said that the threat that Russia was posing to the world was even greater than the threat from Islamic terrorists. The British military also said that China was another global threat.
On November 26, it became known that the British ground forces were preparing to deploy some of the troops and hundreds of units of military hardware to Germany to prepare for a possible war with Russia. In addition, it was reported that the UK was planing to build new military bases in Oman, Kenya and the Federal Republic of Germany.