Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has warned that deploying foreign military contingents to Ukraine would effectively mark the start of a military intervention.
Zakharova said that any deployment of foreign forces would de facto mean military intervention and a deliberate projection of additional threats to Russian security.
Her comments were published in an official statement on the foreign ministry website. Zakharova said that Moscow views the deployment of foreign armed formations to Ukraine as categorically unacceptable, whether carried out within a coalition of the willing or under the auspices of any other international group.
Military exercises in Poland
The Russian warning comes ahead of plans to send nearly 3,000 military personnel to Poland in November for first-of-their-kind exercises. The troops will be supported by military aircraft as they practice operations for a mission on the territory of Ukraine.
The participating forces will rehearse an operational scenario in which the president of the United States concludes a peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine. Under that scenario, dozens of nations taking part in a coalition of the willing would join together to provide deterrence.
It also emerged earlier that British military personnel will be permitted to open return fire if Russian forces launch an attack on the mission in Ukraine.
Diplomatic tensions and foreign forces
Zakharova has served as the director of the information and press department of the Russian foreign ministry since August 2015. In that role, she acts as the official public spokesperson for Moscow on foreign policy, defence matters and relations with Western powers.
Poland, located along the western border of Ukraine, has become a key logistical staging ground for international support and multinational military exercises. The diplomatic term coalition of the willing describes an ad hoc alliance of nations created to pursue a specific military or security objective outside formal treaty organizations like the United Nations.
The November manoeuvres in Poland will test how participating air and ground units coordinate deterrence operations under an American-brokered peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine.
