‘Hybrid war’: US, British advisers telling armed Ukrainians what to do, says Russia

Presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov says ‘hostile’ western countries have stolen Russia’s dollar assets.

File photo of Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov | Credit: kremlin.ru

New Delhi: Russia said Tuesday that western countries, including the United States, were previously unfriendly, but now they were just hostile states.

Presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Western countries were now conducting a “hybrid war” against Russia.

Peskov added US and British advisers were telling armed Ukrainian nationals what to do and providing them with intelligence data. These countries were also waging a “diplomatic and political war” against Russia, he said.

“There are attempts to isolate us in the world. It’s an economic war… It is true that we keep referring to them mildly as unfriendly states, but I should say that they are hostile states, because what they are doing is war,” he said, according to Russian news agency TASS.

The spokesman said the country’s dollar and euro denominated assets that were frozen have “actually been stolen”. “But we are going to fight for them, of course,” he added.

Meanwhile, the longest battle ended in Ukraine early Tuesday when hundreds of wounded soldiers were evacuated out of Mariupol to Russian-held towns.

In a significant defeat, Ukraine ended its mission to defend the last bastion in the port city, the Azovstal steel plant.

Azovstal’s last defenders held out for weeks in bunkers and tunnels built deep underground. Civilians were evacuated from inside the plant, one of the largest metallurgical facilities in Europe, earlier this month.

“The ‘Mariupol’ garrison has fulfilled its combat mission,” the General Staff of Ukraine’s Armed Forces said in a statement. “The supreme military command ordered the commanders of the units stationed at Azovstal to save the lives of the personnel… Defenders of Mariupol are the heroes of our time.”

In his nightly address on Monday, Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called it a “difficult” day.

“Ukraine needs Ukrainian heroes alive. This is our principle. I think that every reasonable person will understand these words,” Zelenskyy said.