NATO chief warns of thousands of Russian troops amassed near Ukraine
NATO chief warns of thousands of Russian troops amassed near Ukraine
April 13, 2021
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NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg condemned a build-up of “thousands” of combat-ready Russian troops at Ukraine’s borders as “unexplained, unjustified and deeply concerning” following a meeting with Kiev’s foreign minister on Tuesday.
At a Brussels press conference, Stoltenberg spoke of the “largest massing of Russian troops since the illegal annexation of Crimea” and called on Moscow to reverse this, “stop its provocations and de-escalate immediately.”
Recent reports of Russian military activity in and around Ukraine as well as ceasefire violations have sparked international concern that the seven-year conflict between the two nations could escalate again.
Moscow annexed the Crimean peninsula after a controversial referendum in 2014. Western governments still consider Crimea to be part of Ukrainian territory.
Parts of Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions along the Russian border are controlled by rebels supported by Moscow.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, who met Stoltenberg at the defence alliance’s headquarters in Belgium, said Russia was gathering troops in north-eastern Ukraine, in Crimea in the south and in Donbas in the east, as the Donetsk and Luhansk regions are collectively known.
If Moscow makes any “reckless move” or starts a new “spiral of violence … it will be costly in all senses,” Kuleba said, adding that Kiev does not want war.
The Ukrainian official is also set to meet US Secretary of State Antony Blinken in Brussels later Tuesday.
Ukraine is not one of NATO’s 30 members but is a close partner. The alliance offers support and capacity-building to the nation’s armed forces, for example.
The G7 nations issued a similar warning to Moscow on Monday.
“These large-scale troop movements, without prior notification, represent threatening and destabilizing activities,” the foreign ministers of Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United States and Britain said in a joint statement on Monday.
“We call on Russia to cease its provocations and to immediately de-escalate tensions in line with its international obligations.”
The ministers reaffirmed their “unwavering support for the independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine within its internationally recognized borders” in the statement.
According to UN estimates, more than 13,000 people have been killed in the conflict since 2014. Since the beginning of this year, 50 fatalities had been reported despite a ceasefire.
On Monday, the Ukrainian army again reported the death of a government soldier.
©2021 dpa GmbH. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.
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