Western army instructors who train Ukrainian soldiers in the country would have no “immunity” from Russian strikes, the Kremlin said Tuesday, amid reports that France could dispatch military trainers to Ukraine.

Ukrainian army chief Oleksandr Syrsky said last week that French military instructors would soon arrive in the country, but Kyiv’s defense ministry later walked back the claim.

French President Emmanuel Macron has refused to rule out deploying troops to Ukraine, despite reluctance from other NATO members and furious warnings from Moscow.

France does not officially have military personnel assisting or training Ukrainian forces in Ukraine at the moment.

Russia has warned against such a step, and previously vowed to destroy any Western military hardware sent to the country.

Three people left five coffins filled with plaster near the base of Eiffel Tower on Saturday, draped with French flags with the inscription “French soldiers in Ukraine.”

Three men were detained and set to be charged Monday over the incident.

Sources close to the case earlier told AFP that the incident was being investigated as possible interference by a foreign power in French affairs.

Olympic disinformation campaign

This comes as the Kremlin on Tuesday dismissed a report from Microsoft that said Russia was ramping up a disinformation campaign ahead of the Paris Olympic Games.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov condemned the Microsoft report as “blanket criticism that has no basis whatsoever.”

A report from Microsoft’s Threat Analysis Center said Russia is waging an intense disinformation campaign aimed at tarnishing the reputation of the International Olympic Committee and stoking fears of violence at this summer’s Paris Games, which open on July 26.

“Russia is ramping up these malign campaigns against France, President (Emmanuel) Macron, the IOC, and the Paris Olympics,” Clint Watts, general manager of the Microsoft Threat Analysis Center, said in a blog post Sunday.

In a statement, the Russian embassy said it “expresses a decisive protest against the latest Russophobic campaign” and said “Russia has not interfered and does not interfere in France’s internal affairs.”

With AFP