Status: 02/17/2022 4:30 p.m
US President Biden assesses the risk of a Russian invasion of Ukraine as “very high” – it could happen in the coming days. The Russian government expelled the deputy US ambassador to Moscow.
Despite all the assurances from Moscow, US President Joe Biden fears a Russian invasion of Ukraine in the coming days. Biden said the threat of invasion was “very high”. In his estimation, it could happen “in the next few days”. There are no plans for him to call Russian President Vladimir Putin, he added.
Russia had only recently expelled the deputy head of the US embassy in Moscow. The expulsion of top diplomat Bart Gorman was “without reason” and represents a “step of escalation,” the State Department said in Washington. “We’ll check our answer.”
Gorman was number two in the US Embassy after Ambassador John Sullivan. According to the US, he had a valid visa and had been deployed to Russia for less than three years. “We call on Russia to end its groundless expulsions of US diplomats and employees,” the US State Department said. “Now it’s more important than ever that our countries have the necessary diplomatic personnel on the ground to facilitate communication between our governments.” Both countries have been expelling each other’s diplomats for some time – a sign of deteriorating diplomatic relations.
“Do everything possible to prevent war”
The US ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, also warned of a possible imminent Russian invasion of Ukraine. “Russia is moving toward an imminent invasion,” she said. She announced that US Secretary of State Antony Blinken would address a UN Security Council meeting on Ukraine later that day. “We’re doing everything we can to prevent war.”
The United States had repeatedly warned Putin against invading Ukraine and threatened massive sanctions in the event of an attack. Most recently, Biden and other Western representatives contradicted the Russian account of a partial withdrawal of Russian troops from the border with Ukraine. Russia, on the other hand, reaffirmed the partial withdrawal today: after the completion of maneuvers, tanks from the western military district were made ready for transport.
Scholz still sees a threat to Ukraine
After consultations with the EU heads of state and government in Brussels, Chancellor Olaf Scholz declared that the situation on the border between Russia and Ukraine remained threatening. Russia still has enough military potential for an invasion there, said the SPD politician. “It’s threatening, and it will remain a threatening situation, and you can’t be naïve.”
He reiterated the dual strategy towards Russia: on the one hand a willingness to talk, on the other hand the threat of tough sanctions. “If there is military aggression against Ukraine, there will be consequences,” he said. The EU is prepared to react with sanctions.
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Media: Russia demands withdrawal of all US troops
According to media reports, the Russian government made it clear that it insists on the complete withdrawal of US troops from Central and Eastern Europe. If the United States does not provide the required security guarantees, Moscow would be “forced to react, including with military-technical means,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a written response to a letter from Washington. At the same time, the Foreign Ministry again emphasized that Russia is not planning an invasion of Ukraine: “There is no ‘Russian invasion’, as the USA and its allies have been officially announcing since the autumn, and it is not planned.”
NATO fears false flag operations
NATO, meanwhile, is alarmed by reports of alleged attacks against pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine. “We are concerned that Russia is trying to stage a pretext for an armed attack on Ukraine,” Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said after deliberations with defense ministers. It is not known what is happening, but the Russian troop deployment in the border area with Ukraine is the largest in Europe for decades. At the same time, it is also known that there are many Russian secret service agents in Ukraine who are also active in Donbass. And one has seen attempts to use “false flag operations” to create a pretext for an invasion of Ukraine.
US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin also called the latest reports “disturbing”. He said in Brussels: “We are still in the process of gathering the details.” It has been said for some time that the Russians could do such a thing to justify a military conflict.
East Ukrainian separatists had previously accused Ukrainian government troops of violating the current ceasefire. The Luhansk rebels said that dozens of mortar shells were fired at several locations in the Luhansk region, especially in the morning hours. Insurgent positions in the Donetsk region were also fired upon. The rebels returned fire. According to government sources, the separatists violated the ceasefire more than 30 times during the day.