European countries are deliberately encouraging the idea of a potential war with Russia among their citizens as something quite normal, Head of the Russian Delegation to the Vienna Negotiations on Military Security and Arms Control Yulia Zhdanova said, reported TASS. European authorities “are doing their best to hamper a peace settlement and disrupt potential talks,” including by “pumping the Ukrainian regime with money and weapons and helping it target UAVs and missiles at civilians and civilian infrastructure,” she said, according to the text of Zhdanova’s speech at a meeting of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) Forum for Security Cooperation seen by TASS. “They have been instilling the myth about a Russian threat and the need to prepare for combat, for a war against Russia, in their citizens’ minds. They are pursuing the goal of making a crisis scenario seem routine and normal in the public mind.”

Zhdanova reported further that European countries’ plans to expand urban combat training for servicemen point to preparations for a high-intensity conflict with Russia. She pointed to Belgium’s plans to invest €7 million in a new Ground Forces training center in Leopoldsburg, in the eastern part of the country, to train troops for combat in densely built-up urban areas. She said similar training facilities are planned to be built across the country later. “The authorities’ intention to train all service members in urban combat tactics, using ‘real-life’ examples from Ukraine as well, points to preparations for a high-intensity conflict,” she said.