11:45

Vladimir Putin has for the first time admitted the presence of Russian military specialists in east Ukraine.

Russia has repeatedly denied a military presence in the conflict, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. But the Russian president conceded there were military intelligence officers operating in the country in a marathon press conference on Thursday.

Asked by a Ukrainian reporter an hour into the briefing about two Russian military intelligence officers captured by Kiev and currently on trial in Ukraine, Putin said: “We never said there were not people there who carried out certain tasks including in the military sphere.” He insisted this was not the same as regular Russian troops.

There was no opportunity for a follow-up question to examine how many military specialists Putin believes were in Ukraine and what exact tasks they were carrying out. At key moments in the conflict in east Ukraine there has been much evidence of regular Russian army involvement.

Putin also initially denied the “little green men” present during the annexation of Crimea were Russian soldiers but afterwards admitted they were.

In the first part of his press conference, Putin also dealt with questions about the Russian economy, corruption, Syria and the recent crisis in relations with Turkey.

He struck an uncompromising note on Turkey, saying if the shooting down of a Russian jet had been an accident, officials could have called Moscow, but instead they called Nato first.

“Someone in the Turkish leadership tried to lick the Americans in a particular place, I don’t know whether the Americans needed that,” said Putin.