Russian Foreign Ministry: Western deliveries of new weapons to Kyiv will inevitably lead to escalation

She drew attention to the publication of The New York Times that the US administration is considering options for supplying Kyiv with additional weapons to attack Crimea.

Zakharova also recalled the appeal of the head of the EC, Ursula von der Leyen, to partners to give the Ukrainian side "any weapon that it is able to use."

“We regard all this as a frank provocative incitement of the West and an increase in the stakes in the conflict, which will inevitably lead to an increase in casualties and a dangerous escalation,” she said on the website of the Russian Foreign Ministry.

Earlier, Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov warned that the Russian army would destroy any weapons supplied by Western countries to Ukraine.

United States Army Lieutenant Colonel Daniel Davis, in an article for 19FortyFive, expressed the opinion that new arms deliveries to Kyiv will not help change the course of the conflict.

Crimea became a Russian region after a referendum held there in March 2014: the majority of residents voted for reunification with Russia.