Tweet from Russian Embassy in UK about bombed Ukrainian hospital removed by Twitter

The Russian Embassy UK account is verified with a blue tick and has more than 150,000 followers

Ukrainian emergency employees work at the side of the damaged by shelling maternity hospital in Mariupol, Ukraine on Wednesday. Picture: AP Photo/Evgeniy Maloletka

Twitter has removed a tweet by the Russian Embassy in the UK which was branded “fake news” by the Culture Secretary.

The embassy, attributing the remark to Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov, suggested a hospital attacked by Kremlin forces in the port city of Mariupol had been “long non-operational” and was being used by Ukrainian armed forces and “radicals”.