President Joe Biden on Tuesday acknowledged the likelihood that US and allied sanctions on Russia in retaliation for an invasion of Ukraine would have significant blowback on the American economy, including possible price hikes and disruption to the nation\u2019s energy supply.
\u201cThe American people understand that defending democracy and liberty is never without cost,\u201d Biden said in remarks at the White House about the ongoing crisis. \u201cI will not pretend this will be painless.\u201d
He said the administration was working proactively to try to preempt supply issues by working with energy producers and shippers on contingency plans, and said he would work with Congress on unspecified \u201cadditional measures to protect consumers and address the impact of prices at the pump.\u201d
Biden also said Tuesday that the U.S. has \u201cnot yet verified\u201d Russia\u2019s claim that some of its forces have withdrawn from the Ukraine border. He said an invasion of Ukraine remains a distinct possibility.
Biden spoke hours after Russia announced that some units participating in military exercises near Ukraine\u2019s borders would begin returning to their bases. Russian President Vladimir Putin earlier Tuesday said Russia was ready for talks with the United States and NATO on military transparency, missile deployment limits and other security issues.
But Biden continued to express skepticism about Russia\u2019s intentions. Biden warned again that if Russia invades Ukraine the U.S. \u201cwill rally the world to oppose its aggression.\u201d
Russian President Vladimir Putin said Tuesday he welcomed a security dialogue with the West as his military reported pulling back some of its troops near Ukraine \u2014 signals that may indicate the Kremlin has opted for a diplomatic path for now despite Western fears of an imminent Russian invasion of its neighbor.
Putin said he doesn\u2019t want war and would rely on negotiations as he presses his demand for the West to halt Ukraine\u2019s bid to join NATO. At the same time, he didn\u2019t commit to a full pullback of troops, saying Russia\u2019s next moves in the standoff will depend on how the situation evolves.
While the overtures soothed global markets that have been on edge amid the worst East-West tensions in decades, Washington and its European allies remained cautious, saying they want to see evidence of a Russian pullback.
The U.S. and NATO have warned that over 130,000 Russian forces massed near Ukraine could invade at any time, and they sent troops and military supplies to shore up NATO members in Eastern Europe. Russia has denied having such plans, demanding that the West keep Ukraine and other ex-Soviet nations out of the alliance, halt weapons deployments near Russian borders, and roll back forces from Eastern Europe.
The U.S. and its allies have roundly rejected the demands, but offered Russia to engage in talks on ways to bolster security in Europe.
Speaking after meeting with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Putin said the West agreed to discuss a ban on missile deployment to Europe, restrictions on military drills and other confidence-building measures \u2014 issues that Moscow had put on the table years ago.
He said Russia is open to discuss \u201csome of those elements,\u201d but added that it would only do that \u201cin complex with the main issues that are of primary importance for us.\u201d
Asked if there could be a war in Europe, Putin said Russia doesn\u2019t want it but said Ukraine\u2019s bid to join NATO posed a major security threat to his country.
While Scholz reiterated that NATO\u2019s eastward expansion \u201cis not on the agenda — everyone knows that very well,\u201d Putin retorted that Moscow will not be assuaged by such assurances.
\u201cThey are telling us it won\u2019t happen tomorrow,\u201d Putin said. \u201cWell, when will it happen? The day after tomorrow? What does it change for us in the historic perspective? Nothing.\u201d
He went on to argue NATO expansion violates the principle of the indivisibility of security enshrined in international documents.
\u201cWe want to solve this issue now as part of negotiation process through peaceful means,\u201d Putin said. \u201cWe very much hope that our partners hear our concerns and take them seriously.\u201d
Scholz also said diplomatic options are \u201cfar from exhausted,\u201d and praised the announcement of a troop withdrawal as a \u201cgood signal,\u201d adding: \u201cWe hope that more will follow.\u201d
The Russian Defense Ministry released images of tanks and howitzers rolling onto railway platforms and more tanks rolling across snowy fields. It did not disclose where or when the images were taken, or where the vehicles were headed, other than \u201cto places of permanent deployment.\u201d
Russian forces continue to threaten Ukraine along the eastern border and from the Black Sea Crimean peninsula that Moscow seized from Ukraine in 2014, the year when it also backed a separatist insurgency in the country\u2019s east. More Russian troops loom over Ukraine in Belarus, where they were deployed for sweeping joint drills.
A US defense official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, said Pentagon analysts are reviewing the Russian withdrawal claims.
Ukraine expressed skepticism about Russia\u2019s statements on the pullback. \u201cWe won\u2019t believe when we hear, we\u2019ll believe when we see. When we see troops pulling out, we\u2019ll believe in de-escalation,\u201d Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said that \u201cso far, we have not seen … any signs of reduced Russian military presence on the borders of Ukraine,\u201d adding that the alliance wants to see a \u201csignificant and enduring withdrawal of forces, troops, and not least the heavy equipment.\u201d
British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss reiterated the invasion danger still exists. Norwegian Foreign Minister Anniken Huitfeldt issued a similar warning, and Estonia\u2019s foreign intelligence agency said the Russian armed forces could launch an operation \u201cfrom the second half of February.\u201d
Few Russians expect a war, following the Kremlin\u2019s dismissal of Western warnings as \u201chysteria\u201d and \u201cabsurdity.\u201d
In a village in Russia\u2019s Belgorod region about 30 kilometers (18 miles) from Ukraine\u2019s border, residents carried on with life as usual, even as more military personnel have been passing through village streets.
\u201cWe are friends with Ukraine,\u201d said villager Lyudmila Nechvolod. \u201cWe are really on the border, we really have relatives here and there, everyone has somebody there (on the Ukrainian side). No one wants war.\u201d
Western officials said they saw no signs of de-escalation but rather the opposite, with Russia continuing to build up combat forces and other capabilities, including field hospitals. They said there are \u201csome signs of a diplomatic opening\u201d and they believe Putin still has not made a final decision to invade but has all the capabilities in place.
A US defense official said small numbers of Russian ground units have been moving out of larger assembly areas for days, taking up positions closer to the Ukrainian border at what would be departure points if Putin launched an invasion. The official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss information not publicly released.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken held a call with Lavrov, according to a State Department official who spoke on condition of anonymity because the call had not been publicly announced.
President Joe Biden, who telephoned French President Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday, is expected to give brief remarks later in the day on efforts to de-escalate Ukraine-Russian tensions, according to the White House.
The US \u201cremains open to high-level diplomacy in close coordination with our allies,\u201d according to an administration statement. \u201cThe United States continues to believe diplomacy and de-escalation are the best path forward, but is prepared for every scenario.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
President Joe Biden on Tuesday acknowledged the likelihood that US and allied sanctions on Russia in retaliation for an invasion of Ukraine would have significant blowback on the American economy, including possible price hikes and disruption to the nation\u2019s energy supply.\u201cThe American people understand that defending democracy and liberty is never without cost,\u201d Biden said …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":36538,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[38,40,37,39,36],"tags":[7214,8592,6858],"class_list":["post-60275","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","","category-commodities-news","category-cryptocurrencies","category-forex-markets","category-global-stock-markets","category-market-updates","tag-biden","tag-russian-ukranian-crisis","tag-us-economy"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/noortrends.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60275","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/noortrends.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/noortrends.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/noortrends.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/noortrends.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=60275"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/noortrends.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60275\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":60280,"href":"https:\/\/noortrends.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60275\/revisions\/60280"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/noortrends.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36538"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/noortrends.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=60275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/noortrends.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=60275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/noortrends.ae\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=60275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}