BRUSSELS: NATO said Tuesday there was still no sign that Russian forces were being withdrawn from the Ukraine border after President Vladimir Putin announced a return to their bases.
“We have not seen a change at the border,” a NATO official said when asked if there had been any developments subsequent to Putin’s announcement Monday.
NATO head Anders Fogh Rasmussen said Monday that after what he believed to be the Russian president’s third such statement, “unfortunately, we have not seen any evidence at all that Russia has started withdrawal.”
NATO has estimated there are some 40,000 Russian troops on the border, whose presence has raised fears they may intervene in troubled eastern Ukraine after Moscow’s annexation of Crimea in March.
NATO: No sign of Russian Ukraine troop pullback
NATO: No sign of Russian Ukraine troop pullback
