According to the news reports by the United States media on Sunday, it received intelligence last week saying that the Russian military had been ordered to move forward with an attack against Ukraine and cited anonymous sources.
That intelligence report was the reason US President Joe Biden was confident on Friday and was convinced that Vladimir Putin had decided to invade Ukraine. As per the Post, the United States Intelligence had provided Biden with the confidence to assert and that came from an order that was given to Russian subordinates to move ahead with a full-scale attack, according to various people who were familiar with the matter.
Both Russia and Ukraine had called for intensified diplomatic efforts yesterday to de-escalate tensions and blamed each other for the sharp rise in shelling on the front line that separated Kyiv’s forces from the Moscow-based separatists. The United States had warned of a Russian invasion, and the French President Emmanuel Macron dubbed his separate calls to both the countries as the last possible and necessary efforts to avert a major conflict in Ukraine.
The United States Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said that Russia is on the verge of invading Ukraine but also promised that President Biden was ready to talk to his Russian counterpart and that the US was ready to seek a diplomatic solution until the tanks in Russia are rolling.
According to the statement by the Kremlin, the President of Russia, Vladimir Putin, was on the call with his French counterpart for almost 105 minutes and said that the cause of the escalation is due to the provocations that were carried out by the security forces of Ukraine. President Putin once again called out the United States of America and NATO to take the demands for Russian security and guarantees seriously. He further said that the two leaders believed that it was important to intensify efforts to find solutions through diplomacy.
French President’s office had also agreed on the need to favour a diplomatic solution to the ongoing crisis between Russia and Ukraine and to do everything to achieve one. He added that foreign ministers of both countries will meet in the coming days.
Russia has demanded that the NATO alliance should permanently rule out any possibility of Ukraine’s bid for its membership and the Western forces that have been deployed in Eastern Europe ever since the cold war has ended should be withdrawn as soon as possible.
The fears of escalation had mounted earlier after Belarus announced that the Russian forces were to remain on its soil after Sunday’s scheduled end to the joint drills between Russia and Belarus. Around 30,000 Russian troops had been carrying out the readiness drills with its ally which were supposed to be finished by Sunday allowing the troops from Moscow to go back to their bases. As per the reports, the troops would remain deployed as the leaders had decided to continue inspections.
According to the French Presidency, Putin had reassured Macron saying that the Russian troops would eventually leave. The world is seeing these extended drills as a further escalation of tensions with Ukraine that is already facing a rise in shelling from the Russia-based separatist rebels and a force of over 150,000 Russian troops hovering on its borders.