NATO accuses Russia of trying to 'stage pretext' to invade Ukraine
Russia has been accused of trying to manufacture a fake reason to invade Ukraine.
Jens Stoltenberg, NATO's secretary-general, said the military alliance was concerned "Russia is trying to stage a pretext for an armed attack against Russia".
Separatist authorities in the Luhansk region of eastern Ukraine -- where Russian-backed separatists have been at war with Ukrainian forces since 2014 -- said there had been an increase in Ukrainian shelling along the tense line of contact, describing it as a “large-scale provocation". Separatist official Rodion Miroshnik said separatists returned fire.
Ukraine disputed the claim, saying separatists had shelled its forces, but they didn’t fire back. The Ukrainian military command said shells hit a kindergarten building in Stanytsia Luhanska, wounding two civilians, and cut off the power supply to half of the town.
An observer mission of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) is expected to offer its assessment of the situation later on Thursday.
US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has meanwhile described as "troubling" reports of mutual accusations of bombing from Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed separatists in eastern Ukraine.
Austin said that Washington and its allies "are still gathering the details, but we've said for some time that the Russians might do something like this in order to justify a military conflict, so we'll be watching this very closely".
Britain's top diplomat, Liz Truss, said such reports "are a blatant attempt by the Russian government to fabricate pretexts for invasion", describing it as a "disinformation campaign".
Her armed forces minister, James Heappey, also accused Moscow of "disinformation" over its claim it is withdrawing troops for the
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