By Michael Hernandez

WASHINGTON

 Secretary of State John Kerry on Tuesday sharply dismissed Russia’s “lies” over its role in the deadly conflict in eastern Ukraine.

“Russia has engaged in a rather remarkable period of the most overt and extensive propaganda exercise that I've seen since the very height of the Cold War,” Kerry said during testimony before the Senate Appropriations committee. “And they have been persisting in their misrepresentations, lies, whatever you want to call them – about their activities there to my face, to the face of others, on many different occasions.”

During later testimony to the Senate Foreign Relations committee, Kerry called the separatists "a de facto extension of the Russian military," and "an instrument of Russian national power."

Russia has consistently denied it arms separatists that have been fighting against Ukraine’s central government in the Donbass region of eastern Ukraine since April 2014. More than 5,300 people have been killed in the fighting with more than 12,000 wounded, according to the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights.

President Barack Obama has considered a possible shipment of lethal defensive aid to Ukraine to bolster their efforts to defeat the separatists. But many of the U.S.’s allies in Europe have cautioned against such a move, uncertain of how Russia would respond.  

When pressed by lawmakers at the Appropriations hearing, Kerry would not divulge his own thinking on the matter.

“That is the conversation that is taking place within the administration right now,” he said. “And until the president makes his decision, I'm going to keep my consultations personal and private with him."