LAST UPDATE | 15 Feb 2022
US PRESIDENT JOE Biden has said that a Russian attack on Ukraine remains “very much” a possibility, but that a diplomatic solution to the crisis could yet be reached.
Speaking from the White House, Biden said the United States had “not yet verified” any withdrawal of Russian troops from Ukraine’s borders, and that “analysts indicate that they remain very much in a threatening position.”
If Russia invades, he warned, the United States is “ready to go” with punishing sanctions. Nevertheless, Biden said, “we should give the diplomacy every chance to succeed.”
Biden also went on to say that the US and Nato are “not a threat to Russia”, adding that neither have missiles in Ukraine.
“We do not have plans to put them there as well”, he said. “We’re not targeting the people of Russia. We do not seek to destabilise Russia”.
He also acknowledged the likelihood that US and allied sanctions on Russia in retaliation for an invasion would have significant blowback on the American economy, including possible price hikes and disruption to the nation’s energy supply.
From the beginning of this crisis, I have been clear and consistent: The United States is prepared no matter what happens.
— President Biden (@POTUS) February 15, 2022
We are ready for diplomacy to improve stability and security in Europe as a whole.
And we are ready to respond decisively if Russia attacks Ukraine.
“The American people understand that defending democracy and liberty is never without cost,” Biden said.
“I will not pretend this will be painless.”
He said the administration was working proactively to try to pre-empt supply issues by working with energy producers and shippers on contingency plans, and said he would work with Congress on unspecified “additional measures to protect consumers and address the impact of prices at the pump”.
It comes after Ukraine said that the sites of its defence ministry and armed forces as well as two state banks were hit by a cyberattack that could have Russian origins.
The announcement from Ukraine’s communications watchdog comes with the former Soviet republic fearing a possible attack from Russian forces conducting massive military drills at its frontiers.
The affected sites include the Oschadbank state savings bank and Privat24 – two of the country’s largest financial institutions.
The defence ministry site showed an error message saying the site was “undergoing technical maintenance”.
The watchdog said Privat24 was hit by “a massive denial of service (DDOS) attack”.
“It cannot be excluded that the aggressor is resorting to dirty tricks,” the watchdog said in reference to Russia.
Russia’s foreign ministry said earlier today that Sergei Lavrov told US Secretary of State Antony Blinken that Moscow urged “pragmatic dialogue” over Ukraine.
“Lavrov emphasised the inadmissibility of the aggressive rhetoric whipped up by Washington and its closest allies, calling for pragmatic dialogue over the entire range of issues raised by Russia,” the ministry said in a statement.
Lavrov also stressed that it was necessary to continue “joint work”.
Russian ambassador to Ireland
The Russian Ambassador to Ireland has given the strongest hint yet that Russia is pulling back from conflict with Ukraine. Speaking to RTÉ Prime Time, Ambassador Yuri Filatov said: “We don’t have any political, military, economic or any other reason to do that. The whole idea is insane.”
Regarding Russian forces assembling near the border with Ukraine, Filatov added: What I can tell our viewers is within maybe 3-4 weeks, the configuration of the forces in the Western region of Russia will resume its normal standard posture.
“Right now we are in the middle of the training exercises which involve really sizeable quantities of troops and infrastructure. This has nothing to do with Ukraine.”
Speaking about the Russian military movements on the eastern Ukraine border, he said: “They will be over by the 20th of February”.
Asked whether the troops might return in the future, Ambassador Filatov said:
“If there is a necessity to come back,[on] exercises, they will. And nobody will teach us what to do and not to do on our own territory, let’s not forget that.”
“They will go exactly where they need to go. They are going in the Russian territory. This is nobody’s business at all.”
Positive signs
Western leaders earlier said that they were seeing positive signs that Russia was looking to ease tensions over Ukraine, after Moscow announced it was pulling back some of the troops deployed on its neighbour’s borders.
In the first announced withdrawal from among more than 100,000 troops Russia amassed on the Ukrainian border, the defence ministry in Moscow said some soldiers and hardware were returning to bases at the end of planned exercises.
Western leaders had accused Moscow of positioning the troops in advance of a possible invasion of pro-Western Ukraine, warning that any attack would be met with severe economic sanctions.
The crisis – the worst between Russia and the West since the end of the Cold War – reached a peak this week with US officials warning that a full-scale invasion, including an assault on the capital Kyiv, was possible within days.
After a meeting today with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Moscow, President Vladimir Putin said Russia “of course” did not want war, and was willing to look for solutions with the West.
“We are ready to work further together. We are ready to go down the negotiations track,” Putin told a joint press conference with Scholz, confirming a “partial pullback of troops”.
The German leader joined others in the West in expressing hope that steps were being taken towards de-escalation in the crisis.
“That we are now hearing that some troops are being withdrawn is in any case a good sign,” Scholz said.
“For Europeans it is clear that lasting security cannot be achieved against Russia but only with Russia.”
This morning, the Russian defence ministry’s spokesman said that some forces deployed near Ukraine had completed their exercises and were packing up to leave.
“Units of the Southern and Western military districts, having completed their tasks, have already begun loading onto rail and road transport and today they will begin moving to their military garrisons,” the ministry’s chief spokesman, Igor Konashenkov, told Russian news agencies.
It was not immediately clear how many units were involved and what impact the withdrawals would have on the overall number of troops surrounding Ukraine, but it was the first announcement of a Russian drawdown in weeks.
Reacting to the announcement, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said that he doesn’t believe what he hears, but what he sees.
“We in Ukraine have a rule: we don’t believe what we hear, we believe what we see. If a real withdrawal follows these statements, we will believe in the beginning of a real de-escalation,” said Kuleba on Twitter.
On Russian statements regarding withdrawal of some forces from the Ukrainian border. We in Ukraine have a rule: we don’t believe what we hear, we believe what we see. If a real withdrawal follows these statements, we will believe in the beginning of a real de-escalation.
— Dmytro Kuleba (@DmytroKuleba) February 15, 2022
Speaking today, NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said that while indications that Russia were willing to try diplomacy over the Ukraine crisis, there are no signs of troops being pulled back from the border.
“There are signs from Moscow that diplomacy should continue, this gives grounds for cautious optimism. But so far, we have not seen any sign of de-escalation on the ground,” Stoltenberg said.
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said that while there has been a “diplomatic opening” in the situation, he said that the intelligence he has received is not encouraging.
Johnson said that field hospitals were being constructed close to Belarus’s border with Ukraine, saying that there were “mixed signals”.
The US has urged its citizens to leave Belarus immediately, citing a buildup of Russian troops along the border neighbouring Ukraine.
A spokesperson for Ireland’s Department of Foreign Affairs told The Journal that it keeps travel advice under constant review, taking into account the safety and security situation.
“The department currently advises against non-essential travel to Belarus,” the spokesperson said.
In a statement this evening, the Department said that it is continuing to monitor the situation in Ukraine closely after travel advice was updated on 12 February.
Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney said that de-escalation reports are welcome and that Russia should engage in talks with other Western nations.
“While recent reports of a move towards de-escalation on the ground – if confirmed – are welcome, it is urgent that Russia de-escalate, abide by international law and engage constructively in dialogue.”
He added that people should not travel to Ukraine and any Irish citizen in Ukraine should register with the Irish embassy there.
So far, 114 people have registered with the embassy, and the Department says this number will change in the coming days.
The Department is also in contact with families who have surrogacy arrangements in Ukraine, and will provide support to them on an individual basis.
This evening, The Journal is reporting that the process of bringing babies born through surrogacy in Ukraine may be expedited due to the current situation,
Talks with Germany
The meeting between Scholz and Putin comes just a day after the new German Chancellor met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv, and a week on from the talks held between French President Emmanuel Macron and Putin.
Support from Germany, a major economic partner for Moscow and importer of Russian gas, is crucial for the package of crippling sanctions that Western leaders say would be imposed in response to an invasion.
In particular, sanctions on the controversial Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline were proposed by Western countries. The pipeline is set to double supplies of Russian gas to Europe.
Comments from Putin’s foreign and defence ministers on Monday had already offered some hope of a de-escalation.
During a carefully choreographed meeting Monday with Putin, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said “there is always a chance” of reaching an agreement with the West over Ukraine.
He told Putin that exchanges with leaders in European capitals and Washington showed enough of an opening for progress on Russia’s goals to be worth pursuing.
The Kremlin insists NATO must give assurances Ukraine will never be admitted as a member and roll back its presence in eastern European countries.
© AFP 2022, with additional reporting by Press Association, Michelle Hennessy and Tadgh McNally.
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