Thursday, March 13, 2014, 23:00
Ukraine has a plan “B” in case of open aggression by Russia, NSDC Secretary Andriy Parubiy announced during a briefing on Wednesday.
When asked whether the National Security Council is developing a plan for the evacuation of residents of Crimea in case of real beginning of hostilities Parubiy said, “Of course, we have a plan “B”. I cannot tell the details, but this plan will be elaborated and implemented very quickly. It is not only about the evacuation,” he said.
Parubiy added that the Ukrainian government has information about the concentration of Russian troops across the border with Ukraine. He recalled that Russia previously declared the military exercises, and after five days the troops were to be withdrawn from the Ukraine-Russia border.
“But today those forces have not been recalled; instead, military capabilities are increasing in those groups on the border with Ukraine,” he said.
“Unfortunately, the situation is critical not only in Crimea, but across the north-eastern border. Indeed, some of the Russian troops are a few hours travel from Kyiv,“ said Parubiy.
“I cannot say much, but I will say that our units are located so that we could fight off an attack from any direction ,” – said Parbuiy.
He once again urged the international partners of Ukraine to help; if the world will not help, “the question of need for nuclear disarmament will rise very sharply, because each state determines that there are no guarantees other than that the presence of nuclear weapons is a real limiting factor.”
According to him, the most risky in terms of separatism are Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson, and Odesa.
“There have been attempts to create fighting forces similar to the Crimean “self-defense”, but thanks to joint efforts of Ukrainian power units even their bases were localized.”
He added that the National Security Council has information that Russia has invested heavily in a group of Russian agitators, “who in the early days were able to enter Ukraine and are now moving from one city to another, creating an appropriate image for Russian channels.”
According to Parubiy, generally, the Ukrainian authorities have succeeded in localizing the separatist sentiment in the southeast.
The original text is on Ukrainska Pravda at: http://www.pravda.com.ua/news/2014/03/12/7018510/
