MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 05th April, 2019) US Special Representative for Ukraine Negotiations Kurt Volker said on Friday that Russia was using RT broadcaster and Sputnik news agency as tools to influence the situation in Ukraine, which held the first round of the presidential election last week.
Volker was asked by PBS NewsHour's correspondent Nick Schifrin about Russian President Vladimir Putin potentially "testing" Ukrainian presidential candidate Volodymyr Zelenskiy or "using this moment as a way to somehow change the status quo" in Ukraine.
"I think we can assume, based on Russia's behavior up to now, that they will continue to test whoever is the president of Ukraine. They � they have invaded. They have taken territory. They keep the fighting going. You see all kinds of propaganda, RT, Sputnik, cyberattacks. The whole � the whole toolbox is on display in Ukraine," Volker said.
Ukraine's incumbent President Petro Poroshenko came second in the first round of the presidential election with nearly 16 percent, while Zelenskiy secured over 30 percent of the vote. They will face each other in the runoff on April 21.
The conflict in Ukraine broke out in 2014 when two eastern regions refused to recognize a drastic power change in Kiev and took up arms against the central government in the wake of Crimea's secession and reunion with Russia. Ukraine and Western powers accused Russia of stirring the conflict and meddling in eastern Ukraine, a claim rejected by Moscow, which says it has no part in its neighbor's domestic conflict.
