A top Russian general reportedly told US officials in Moscow he was "very depressed" about the "tragic" situation in Ukraine in what was described as a rare outburst of emotion.
Quoting a readout of an in-person meeting between Pentagon and Kremlin military officials in Moscow last week, CNN reported that two US defence attachés were shocked at the general’s "revealing moment".
The meeting with Russian Major General Yevgeny Ilyin, deputy chief of the main directorate of international cooperation, came amid accusations that a Ukraine missile strike killed 23 civilians in the rebel-held Donetsk region.
The readout noted the attaches thought Gen Ilyin stopped just short of accusing US and Ukraine of atrocities against his family, which has roots in the Donetsk region that was allegedly shelled last week.
While his comments have been interpreted as an example of low morale among Russia’s senior military leadership, it was unclear from reporting of the readout if the unscripted moment was directed at the progress of Moscow’s invasion or Kyiv’s alleged "war crimes" in Donetsk, which Ukraine denies.
The Russian defence ministry said 23 civilians had been killed, and 28 injured, when a Ukrainian Tochka-U missile was intercepted above Donetsk.
Local separatist leader Denis Pushilin told Russia’s Rossiya 24 network that parts of the rocket had landed in the city centre, where people were in line at an ATM and bus stop.
“There are children among the dead,” Mr Pushilin added.
Neither Russian nor Ukrainian accounts of the missile attack or civilian causalities have been independently verified.
The "tense" face-to-face meeting, held the same week, was one of the few interactions between American and Russian defence officials.
Repeated attempts by US military leaders to speak with Russian counterparts via phone on a "deconfliction channel" have gone unanswered since the start of the war on 24 February, according to Pentagon spokesman John Kirby.
At the end of the in-person meeting last week, one of the American officials "casually inquired" about the family of Gen Ilyin, who was born in Ukraine’s Dnipropetrovsk region before moving with his family to Donetsk, where he went to school.
Gen Ilyin’s “stoic demeanor suddenly became flushed and agitated”. He said the current situation in Ukraine is "tragic and I am very depressed over it" before leaving without shaking hands, according to CNN’s reporting of the readout.
After the US attaches concluded his the emotion was directed at atrocities against his family, one wrote: "The fire in his eyes and flustered demeanour left a chill down the spine."
Another attendee’s "jaw dropped", and both reported that they’ve never "witnessed such an outburst by Russian counterparts at an official meeting".
Reporting of the meeting did not include the missile attack on the Donetsk region where Gen Ilyin lived with his family, but instead left what led to the reaction and visible signs of stress as "unclear".
"At the very least, it is clear that morale problems among Russian forces are not limited to front-line troops," the readout concludes.
