MOSCOW, 20 January (BelTA) – During the briefing for the press the Belarusian news agency BelTA asked Maria Zakharova, the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, to comment on the statements on Belarus by some U.S. State Department senior official who said that Russia could intend to station troops in Belarus under the guise of joint military exercises in order, potentially, to attack Ukraine from the north and that the draft constitutional changes may indicate Belarus plans to allow both Russian conventional and nuclear forces to be stationed on its territory.
"They cite education in the United States as one of their achievements. But when you hear statements by U.S. officials, you begin to doubt the quality of the educational process, to be honest. Because it is either the misreading of the reality, or poor knowledge of the things on the ground or the inability to come to some analytical conclusion based on the facts," Maria Zakharova said.
"Our U.S. partners talk absolute nonsense. They completely ignore the Belarusian agenda and realities, the things happening around this country [Belarus], the things happening on its border. They endlessly emphasize some political component, citing some things as facts but they are not facts at all. It is impossible to go into this in detail,” the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry said.
She cited the West's numerous statements about Russia's imminent invasion of Ukraine. “Speculations are repeated frequently and then are presented as reality, as facts,” Maria Zakharova said.
“Much of what we hear from Washington now is incomprehensible, even for U.S. officials because all this is so out of touch with the real situation. There is another example: the other day Victoria Nuland [Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs of the United Stated] said that they have ‘18 response scenarios in case Russia decides to invade Ukraine'. I have the impression that everyone was shocked there, including the Department of State, the White House and other U.S. security agencies. What are these 18 scenarios? Where did she get them? They did not have anything to say about it when they were asked the relevant questions,” Maria Zakharova said.
“All these statements are of the same kind,” the Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said.
