In return, the United Kingdom blamed Russia on Friday evening for the cyber attack targeting Ukraine’s financial sector, with Moscow denying any involvement.

“The UK government believes that Russian military intelligence (GRU) was involved in this week’s ‘computer’ attacks … against the financial sector in Ukraine,” a UK Foreign Office spokesman said in a statement. Press release, at a time when crisis tensions with Russia are at their peak around Ukraine.

“This disruptive behavior is unacceptable, Russia must stop these activities and respect Ukrainian sovereignty,” the spokesperson continued, accusing Moscow of being “responsible” for the attacks on two state-owned banks by the United States. Immediately after the imposition, but also against the Ukrainian. military websites.

The UK statement emphasized that “the decision to publicly attribute this incident underscores the fact that the UK and its allies will not tolerate any malicious cyber activity”.

The text specifies that the British National Cyber ​​Security Center believes that Russian military intelligence is “almost certainly” involved in the computer attacks on Tuesday and Wednesday.

Ukrainian officials pointed the finger at “offensive”, an expression commonly used to designate Russia, after this cyberattack, which targeted, according to Kiev, the sites of the Defense Ministry and the country’s armed forces. As well as PrivitBank Bank and Oshchabank.

The British Foreign Office has also announced a “temporary” move of its embassy in Ukraine from Kiev to Lviv in the country’s west amid fears of a Russian invasion.

British diplomacy has called on British citizens to avoid non-essential travel to Belarus, as well as the Moldovan region of Transnistria.