"The United States has also worked collaboratively to improve Ukraine’s biological safety, security, and disease surveillance for both human and animal health, providing support to 46 peaceful Ukrainian laboratories, health facilities, and disease diagnostic sites over the last two decades," the Defense Department said in a press release.
In addition, the Defense Department emphasized that Ukraine has no nuclear, chemical or biological weapons programs.
However, Russian Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev said earlier this month that the US biological laboratories in Ukraine experimented with deadly diseases. The activities prompted Russia to adopt additional measures to defend Russian citizens as well as citizens of neighboring states against biological threats.
In February, the Russian Defense Ministry said it discovered the existence of 30 US-funded military biological laboratories in Ukraine. The Defense Ministry said the United States has spent more than $200 million to develop biological weapons in the facilities in Ukraine.
The Russian authorities have also said that the biological laboratories in Ukraine constitute a small part of the global US network of more than 300 similar facilities around the world.