"The presence of the ‘Mount Whitney’, flagship of the US Sixth Fleet and the USS Porter in the Black Sea, as well as the NATO naval manoeuvres, are clearly a provocation of Russia… Can you imagine what the American reaction would be if the Russian navy organised manoeuvres in international waters off the American coast, near Washington DC?" he told Sputnik.
"This is very serious and could push Ukrainian politicians, the culprits of this widespread corruption, into a headlong rush action, for example into a hazardous military offensive in Donbass or an armed provocation of Russia in the Black Sea", he said.
"NATO should have been dismantled at the same time as the Warsaw Pact was suppressed in the last century and the present expansion, and projection by NATO of military forces to the whole world is very alarming", he said.