Manas Dasgupta
NEW DELHI, Feb 15: The tense Russia-Ukraine border standoff showed first signs of thaw and the European share markets improved on Tuesday after Moscow claimed it was pulling back some of its forces to their bases but NATO rejected the claim stating that there was no signs of de-escalation of forces on the Ukrainian borders. Over 100,000 Russian troops have been stationed along the Ukraine border for the past weeks.
Amid reports that Kremlin is pulling back some troops from the border on Tuesday, the NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said there was “cautious optimism” over Russia signals on Ukraine, but no sign of de-escalation. “So far, we have not seen any de-escalation on the ground, not seen any signs of reduced Russian military presence on the borders of Ukraine, but we will continue to monitor. Everything is now in place for a new attack but Russia still has time to step back from the brink: stop preparing for war and start preparing for a peaceful solution,” Stoltenberg told reporters.
But Ukraine said on Tuesday that it appeared that Kyiv and the West had been able to deter an invasion. “We and our allies have managed to prevent Russia from any further escalation,” Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba told reporters on Tuesday, though he added a note of caution. “We have a rule: don’t believe what you hear, believe what you see. When we see a withdrawal, we will believe in a de-escalation,” he said.
Russia said it was pulling back some of its forces near the Ukrainian border to their bases, in what would be the first major step towards de-escalation in weeks of crisis with the West. The move came amid an intense diplomatic effort to avert a feared Russian invasion of its pro-Western neighbour and after Moscow amassed more than 1,00,000 troops near Ukraine’s borders.
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. The development comes hours after fresh satellite images released by Maxar technologies showed massive troop build-up near Ukraine’s borders, which spurred fears of an invasion.
Russia said it sent forces to Belarus and other neighbouring countries for military exercises, but the western powers widely believed that the troops were meant to attack Ukraine, which has shown overtures to join West-backed NATO.
As the news of Russian troops leaving for their bases spread, it brought relief in oil markets. The price of the oil had reached its highest level since 2014. But British Foreign Secretary Liz Truss earlier told Sky News that words are easy, but the only thing she will believe is “when they move the troops away from the border.”
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz was set to be the latest European leader to meet Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday with talks due later in Moscow. The crisis — the worst between Russia and the West since the end of the Cold War — reached a peak this week, with U.S. officials warning that a full-scale invasion, including an assault on the Ukrainian capital Kyiv, was possible within days.
On Tuesday morning, the Russian Defence Ministry spokesman said 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, said in a statement.
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.
Konashenkov said “large-scale” Russian military drills were continuing in many areas, including joint exercises in Belarus and naval exercises in the Black Sea and elsewhere. If Western officials confirm that Moscow is taking steps to reduce its forces, it would help ease fears of a major war in Europe that have been rising for weeks.
Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova suggested on Tuesday’s news would show it was the West that had been raising tensions with its accusations of an invasion plan. “February 15, 2022, will go down in history as the day Western war propaganda failed. Humiliated and destroyed without a single shot being fired,” she wrote on social media.
Comments from Putin’s foreign and defence ministers on Monday had already offered some hope of a de-escalation. During a carefully choreographed meeting on 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. Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu meanwhile told Putin that some Russian military drills launched in December were “ending” and more would end “in the near future.”
The German chancellor was to meet Putin a day after talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kyiv, where the German leader urged Moscow “to take up the existing offers of dialogue.” 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.
Ahead of Tuesday’s talks, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock warned that “the situation is particularly dangerous and can escalate at any moment. The responsibility for de-escalation is clearly with Russia, and it is for Moscow to withdraw its troops,” she said in a statement.
Moscow has repeatedly blamed the crisis on the West, saying the United States and Western Europe were ignoring Moscow’s legitimate security concerns. The Kremlin insists NATO must give assurances Ukraine will never be admitted as a member and roll back its presence in eastern European countries. Russia already controls the Crimean Peninsula that it seized from Ukraine in 2014 and supports separatist forces who have taken control of parts of eastern Ukraine, in a conflict that has claimed more than 14,000 lives.
U.S. President Joe Biden and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson agreed in a call late on Monday that “a crucial window for diplomacy” remained. “The leaders emphasised that any further incursion into Ukraine would result in a protracted crisis for Russia, with far-reaching damage for both Russia and the world,” a Downing Street spokesman said.
Amid some claims from U.S. officials that an invasion was being prepared for Wednesday, Zelensky declared it a “Unity Day”, urging Ukrainians to take the streets in peaceful demonstrations of solidarity.
The West-led resistance to Putin’s push has warned of sanctions against the Kremlin if Russian troops enter Ukraine. These sanctions will impact key companies in Russia’s important energy, defence and financial sectors. However, some experts have warned of retaliation from Russia, like cutting of oil supply etc.
The Kremlin is insisting that NATO must give assurance that Ukraine will never be admitted as a member and roll back its presence in eastern European countries. US President Joe Biden and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson agreed in a call late Monday that “a crucial window for diplomacy” remained.
Russia’s lower house of parliament voted on Tuesday to ask Putin to recognise two Russian-backed breakaway regions in eastern Ukraine as independent, the house speaker said. The move by the State Duma, if approved, could further inflame a wider standoff over a Russian military build-up near Ukraine that has fuelled Western fears that Moscow could attack. Russia denies any invasion plans and has accused the West of hysteria. Recognition of the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics could kill off the Minsk peace process in east Ukraine, where a conflict between government forces and Moscow-backed separatists has killed 15,000 people. “Kyiv is not observing the Minsk agreements. Our citizens and compatriots who live in Donbass need our help and support,” Vyacheslav Volodin, the State Duma speaker, wrote on social media.
But NATO Secretary-General warned Moscow against recognising the self-declared Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics in eastern Ukraine. “If that happens, that will be a blatant violation of Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty once again, because there is no doubt that Donetsk and Luhansk are part of Ukraine within internationally recognised borders,” Stoltenberg told reporters in Brussels.
“So such a recognition would be a violation of international law and territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine. Not only that, it will also be a violation of the Minsk agreements, so it will make it even harder to find a political solution based on the Minsk agreements”, he added.
