After all, they talk – politics

The USA and Russia want to intensify their dialogue. However, the Kremlin is still not sending any signals of de-escalation and is continuing its troop deployment in the border area with Ukraine. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in Geneva on Friday after talks with his Russian colleague Sergey Lavrov that it had been agreed to continue the diplomatic process. Washington will provide Moscow with a written response to the request for security guarantees next week.

It would identify areas in which negotiations are conceivable, said Blinken. Agreements on arms control or transparency measures for maneuvers are considered conceivable. But the US would also voice its own concerns about Russia’s behavior and reaffirm the principles of the European security order. These include maintaining the territorial integrity of all states, respecting their sovereignty and the free choice of alliances.

Lavrov made it clear that Moscow would make its further action dependent on the content of this document. “I cannot say whether we are on the right track or on the wrong track. We will only understand that ourselves when we have the written answers,” he said. Among other things, Russia demands that the USA and NATO guarantee that they will not accept any further members into the alliance. NATO would also have to withdraw all troops from Eastern Europe and the USA would have to transfer nuclear weapons stationed in Europe to their own territory.

According to Blinken, another meeting of the two foreign ministers is planned after consultations in the capitals. In principle, the USA is also open to another summit meeting between Presidents Joe Biden and Vladimir Putin. If such a gathering would be helpful, “then we are fully prepared to do so,” Blinken said. Lavrov said in a separate press conference that Putin is always ready to talk to Biden. However, it must be well prepared.

Blinken called the meeting “open” and “helpful” and said it went off without polemics. However, he also heard things with which he disagreed. “I think we’re on a clear path now in terms of understanding each other’s concerns and positions,” he added.

Lavrov made a similar statement. The exchange was “useful”, “substantial” and “open”. At the same time he rejected the alleged “anti-Russian hysteria”. Russia is not threatening anyone or invading any country, he said, citing fears in the West that an invasion of Ukraine could be imminent. Blinken countered that they were looking at “what was visible to everyone” and again called on Russia to withdraw its troops from areas near the border.

Russia has deployed armored vehicles, air defense systems and thousands of soldiers to Belarus, who, according to official information, are to take part in joint maneuvers there in early February along the borders of the NATO states of Poland and Lithuania and Ukraine. The US also put four Ukrainians on sanctions lists accused of working on behalf of the Russian secret service to destabilize Ukraine.

Federal Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock called on Russia and Ukraine to hold new talks on the humanitarian situation in eastern Ukraine. She had “agreed with Lavrov to make preparations to talk about every single sentence of the Minsk agreements,” she said Süddeutsche Zeitung. You expect difficult conversations. “We will have to fight for every millimeter more security.”

She reiterated the German government’s opposition to the delivery of lethal weapons to Ukraine. Every state has the right to self-defense, including Ukraine, said Baerbock. “And if other states are willing to supply weapons for defense, it’s not up to us to criticize that.” However, she does not consider it realistic to reverse the military imbalance with such supplies.

Germany and its partners in NATO, the EU and the G7 agree that “every new violation of the Ukrainian borders would have serious consequences”. A long list of options for action has been identified, “precisely because we have to be prepared for different scenarios, from acts of sabotage to the deactivation of critical infrastructure.” With the invasion of Crimea and the start of the conflict in eastern Ukraine in 2014, the Russian tactic of low-threshold escalation and hybrid attacks caught the West by surprise. “Today we are prepared for it.”

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