MOSCOW (Sputnik) — In mid-May, during an interview with the German public broadcaster ZDF, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko once again claimed that some 11,000 Russian servicemen were allegedly deployed in eastern Ukraine
“We are hearing claims about up to 10,000 Russian servicemen [being deployed on the Ukrainian territory]. I think these claims are rather conspicuous considering that the Americans, with all their technological capabilities, have so far failed to show us any real, convincing and concrete proof.”
The minister added that Russia is currently studying poor-quality Xeroxed copies of US satellite images that have been recently handed over to Moscow.
“We are studying them, but it’s hard to discern what has been photographed there,” Lavrov stressed.
After Kiev launched a military operation in Donbas in April 2014, the Ukrainian government, the United States and its allies repeatedly accused Russia of aiding pro-independence fighters of Donetsk and Luhansk including by sending troops to fight on their side. These claims, however, have not been confirmed independently.