The issue was raised on Friday by Russian envoy to the UN office and other international organizations in Geneva Alexey Borodavkin in an interview with TASS news agency.
Commenting on reports that the Syrian army was just planning an offensive, Borodavkin said, “This started already many weeks ago. This is not new.”
“I have simply repeated what [Russian General Staff Main Operations Directorate chief Lt. Gen. Sergey] Rudskoy said. It was said many weeks ago that an operation was being prepared to unblock Deir ez-Zor," the diplomat said.
On January 11, Rudskoy said the Syrian armed forces, supported by Russian warplanes, were mounting an offensive on Raqqa.
Some media reports said earlier that the Syrian army was just planning an offensive to retake Raqqa and Deir ez-Zor.