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Defense Secretary Grant Shapps on his way to a cabinet meeting in London
Photo: Justin Tallis / AFP
British Defense Secretary Grant Shapps canceled a trip to the port city of Odessa for security reasons during his recent visit to Ukraine.
This is reported by the Sunday Times, whose reporter was in Shapps' delegation.
Accordingly, the trip to the south was canceled because, according to intelligence information, Russia became aware of the planned visit on March 8th.
The minister was already in Kiev and held talks there.
The top British military commander, Tony Radakin, was also part of the delegation.
Shapps sharply criticized Russian President Vladimir Putin.
"Putin has shown that he is ruthless, unscrupulous and careless," the minister told the newspaper.
He pointed out that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis were in Odessa when the city was attacked by Russian missiles.
Putin came "dangerously close to assassinating two Western leaders, whether intentionally or accidentally," said Shapps.
Puzzles about the government machine's GPS signal
The British Ministry of Defense said: "On a recent trip to Ukraine, the Defense Secretary did not make a planned visit to Odessa for security reasons."
It also recently became known that the GPS signal of the British government plane on which Shapps returned from a visit to the NATO exercise "Steadfast Defender" in Poland had failed, presumably due to the use of Russian jammers.
It was unclear whether the plane was specifically targeted.
mamk/dpa