Russian intel chief argues France, Germany, UK are 'escalating' tensions around Ukraine, adds Moscow is ready to act against this
Moscow's intel chief warned on Tuesday that Poland and the Baltic states would be “the first to suffer” in the event of a NATO attack on Russia or its ally Belarus.
Sergey Naryshkin, head of the Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR), told state media outlets in Moscow that Russia will certainly inflict damage on NATO as a whole should the military alliance decide to attack it and neighboring Belarus.
Naryshkin argued that “the first to suffer” will be “the bearers of such ideas among the political circles of Poland and the Baltic countries.”
He further argued that Poland and the Baltic nations are “distinguished by high aggressiveness,” going on to remind Warsaw's East Shield initiative, which seeks to fortify the country's borders with Belarus and Russia's Kaliningrad exclave.
“This is sad. They cannot understand that it was the build-up of military activity near the borders of Russia and Belarus that became one of the factors, one of the reasons for the current large, acute and very dangerous crisis on the European continent,” he said.
The Russian intel chief also accused France, Germany, and the UK of "escalating" tensions around Ukraine.
“Therefore, we need to act preemptively. We are ready for this,” Naryshkin said, adding that both Moscow and Minsk face difficult and specific tasks to ensure the security of their respective countries, but that “quite a lot” has already been done in this regard.
