Russia has not aggressive plans against anyone, Kremlin says

Russia is not going to attack anyone, Putin's official spokesman Dmitry Peskov said. On November 22, the head of the main intelligence department of the Ukrainian Ministry of Defense, Kirill Budanov, said in an interview with Military Times that Moscow was allegedly preparing to attack Ukraine. Bloomberg then said that US intelligence believed that Russia was allegedly planning an invasion of Ukraine from three directions - from the territory of Crimea, from the mainland border and from Belarus. The agency also said that Russia allegedly called in tens of thousands of reservists on a scale unprecedented in post-Soviet times.

"Russia does not harbor any aggressive plans. It is completely wrong to say the opposite, and it is completely wrong to associate any movement of the Russian Armed Forces across the territory of our country with such plans. This is not true," Peskov told reporters.

Both US and Ukrainian media claim that Russia is preparing to attack Ukraine, while the Russian side claims that Kiev is planning aggressive actions against the self-proclaimed republics of  Luhansk and Donetsk. 

"This is a nuance that needs to be understood and interpreted correctly," Peskov said. 

Putin's spokesman added that compliance with the Minsk Accords was the best guarantee of security as far as the Ukrainian crisis was concerned. He described the lack of progress in their implementation as a trigger, which leads to an increase in the level of tensions in Europe in general. 

The Kremlin spokesman noted that sending military advisers and weapons from Western countries to Kiev was making the whole situation even more complicated. 

“We are deeply concerned about the provocative actions of the Ukrainian armed forces on the line of contact and preparations for a possible military solution to the crisis in the Donbass," Peskov said. 

Ukraine and Western states have recently expressed concerns about Russia's alleged military buildup near the borders of Ukraine. Moscow states that the Russian troops move inside the Russian territory and do not pose any threat to anyone.