NEW DELHI. April 28 (Interfax) - The conflict in Ukraine reaffirms that Washington and its allies are seeking to push other countries toward military confrontation with Moscow and Beijing, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said.
"Today Washington and its accomplices are carrying out their strategic plot designed to provoke other countries to engage in military confrontation with undesirable states, primarily Russia and China. Vivid confirmation of such criminal policy is the conflict in Ukraine. Its true goal is to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia, generate a threat to China and maintain the monopoly position in the world," Shoigu said at a meeting of the defense ministers of Shanghai Cooperation Organization member countries in New Delhi on Friday.
"To this end, more than $5 billion was spent on the Maidan anti-constitutional coup in 2014, which led to the emergence of a hostile nationalist Russophobic regime on our border that zealously rushed to resolve the 'Russian issue' in Ukraine," he said.
"Given Kiev's refusal to implement the Minsk agreements and the real threat for the residents of Donbass, we decided to start the special military operation," Shoigu said.