Ukraine said its artillery destroyed part of a Russian armoured column that
entered its territory overnight and said its forces came under shellfire
from
Russia on Friday in what appeared to be a major military escalation
between the ex-
Soviet states.
Russia's government denied its forces had crossed into Ukraine. It called the
Ukrainian report "some kind of fantasy" and accused
Kiev of trying to
sabotage aid deliveries to eastern areas torn by fighting between
pro-Russian separatists and the Western-backed government of
Moscow's former
satellite.
Nato said there had been a Russian incursion into Ukraine, which is not a
member of the Western mutual defence pact, but it avoiding calling it an
invasion. Other European capitals accused
the Kremlin of escalating a
conflict that has revived
Cold War-era animosities and chilled the region's
struggling economies.
The United Nations said it could not verify the reports from the Ukrainian
border but called for an immediate de-escalation.
Kiev and its
Western allies have repeatedly accused Russia of arming
pro-Moscow separatist rebels in eastern Ukraine, and of sending undercover
military units onto Ukrainian soil. They have also expressed concern Russia
may use an aid convoy it has assembled on the border as a pretext for
stoking the conflict.
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