US: Russian Claim Could Be Setup for Chemical Weapons

President Biden's spokesperson said Wednesday that false claims Russia made about US involvement with biological weapons in Ukraine fit a familiar pattern and raise a new concern. The allegations are the sort of "false pretexts we have been warning the Russians would invent," Jen Psaki said in a statement, adding that Russia has been known to accuse Western nations of the same violations that it's committing. Now that it's making accusations, and they're reverberating in China, the Hill reports, Psaki said, "We should all be on the lookout for Russia to possibly use chemical or biological weapons in Ukraine, or to create a false flag operation using them."

The US has warned about the invention of such a pretext since last month. Russian foreign ministry spokesperson earlier Wednesday had said it had evidence that the US has backed a bioweapons program in Ukraine that's included plague, cholera, and anthrax. A Russian deputy ambassador to the UN called on Western news media on Wednesday to report "the news about secret biological laboratories in Ukraine." The US and Ukraine denied the claim, per the Guardian, with the State Department calling it "pure nonsense." Using a familiar description, Pentagon press secretary John Kirby on Wednesday called the Russian claim "a bunch of malarkey," per the AP. (More Russia-Ukraine war stories.)