De-escalation on the ground after the Russian-Ukrainian talks in Istanbul was a goodwill gesture by Russia, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Tuesday.
"And it was at the very moment when, in accordance with the agreements of Istanbul, the Russian side decided as a goodwill gesture to conduct some de-escalation of the situation on the ground, primarily in the Kiev region and in the Chernihiv region, that very moment three days after our military left the town of Bucha, the provocation that we are talking about today was organized there," the minister said.
As the Russian foreign minister noted, the provocation in Bucha was done in order to divert attention from the negotiation process. "We have every reason to believe that it was done in order to divert attention from the negotiation process, to divert attention from the fact that the Ukrainian side had already started to win back after Istanbul, tried to put forward all new conditions, and as soon as the Western media broke the fake about the town of Bucha, the Ukrainian negotiators tried to interrupt the negotiation process altogether," Lavrov pointed out.
On April 3, the Russian defense ministry denied accusations by the Kiev regime of killing civilians in Bucha in the Kiev region. The ministry said that the Russian Armed Forces completely left Bucha as early as March 30, and that "evidence of crimes" only appeared on the fourth day, when officers of the Security Service of Ukraine arrived in the city. The Russian defense ministry also stressed that on March 31, the mayor of Bucha, Anatoliy Fedoruk, confirmed in a video message that there were no Russian soldiers in the city, without mentioning any locals shot in the streets.
GSV "Russia - Islamic world"
Photo: Russian Foreign Ministry
Based on materials from TASS