Russia on April 4 said it had summoned France's charge d'affaires in Moscow to protest "false publications" by the French embassy about alleged atrocities in Ukraine blamed on the Russian army.
Moscow "strongly protested against the statements published by the embassy on social media", the Russian foreign ministry said in a statement.
"It is categorically unacceptable to make false accusations against our military," the ministry said, accusing France of "actively supplying military equipment and ammunition to the Ukrainian army and thus doing everything possible to prolong hostilities".
According to Moscow, the offending French statements include mention of the massacre attributed to Russian forces in Bucha, a town near Kyiv where the bodies of civilians were discovered after the withdrawal of Russian troops.
Ukraine on Sunday marked the first anniversary of the gruesome discovery.
Prosecutors in Kyiv say Russian forces killed some 1,400 civilians around Bucha and that they have identified dozens of Russian soldiers responsible.
Ukraine says 37 children were among the dead.
Moscow has denied any involvement in the deaths and has repeatedly referred to them as being "staged" by Kyiv.
The Russian foreign ministry again on Tuesday referred to "unfounded" accusations, saying it had not seen any evidence of Russian crimes or any "objective investigation" of the facts.
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Comments ( 1)
Whenever a lie sounds better to Putin's regime than the truth, a lie is what we get.
Since Feb 2021 the great majority of their communications are lying propaganda.
If they can stop non-Russians contradicting their lies, even better for them.
Within Russia, they have lots of high windows, poison, assassins, and thousands of political prisoners.
Every day and in every way, closer to Stalin's USSR.