Joe Biden’s administration is considering several options to respond to “Russian military pressure on Ukraine”. This ranges from increasing military support to Ukraine to strengthening diplomacy. This became the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) communicated. Also, according to the newspaper, one of the options is to curtail US military exercises in Europe and suspend military aid to Ukraine in order to reduce the risk of a confrontation with Russia.
The US intends to discuss these options at a meeting of NATO foreign ministers. The US Deputy Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, Karen Donfried, said the day before that Washington would discuss possible options at the meeting. She did not provide any details about the Washington proposals. According to the WSJ, Joe Biden’s administration discussed possible options in the run-up to the meeting.
According to the WSJ, what the USA can offer NATO:
Strengthening Ukraine’s defense capacities, increasing air defenses and other military support, and imposing economic sanctions on Russia;
Limiting US military exercises in Europe, “which, according to Russia, are provocative in nature” and suspending military aid to Ukraine;
a more “determined” commitment to the Minsk agreements.
US President Joe Biden said the day before that he would “in all likelihood” hold talks with Russian and Ukrainian presidents Vladimir Putin and Zelensky.
Zelensky had recently stated that, despite the deployment of Russian troops in Ukraine, the situation was no worse than it was in the spring of this year. He pointed out that the number of troops was higher than in the summer when a full ceasefire had come into force in Donbass.
Putin had previously stated that “Western partners are aggravating the situation” in Donbass by supplying Ukraine with “deadly modern weapons and carrying out provocative military maneuvers”.
WSJ notes that the discussion in the Biden administration took place against the background of the statement by Ukrainian President Zelensky about the preparation of a coup in the country. This is allegedly discussed by Russian and Ukrainian citizens. The name of the richest man in the country, Rinat Akhmetov, was mentioned.
Ukrainian President Zelensky recently announced that he had learned that a Russian-initiated coup would take place and that there had been sound recordings from representatives of the Russian administration and Akhmetov.
[hrsg/russland.NEWS]
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