“MASSIVE” RETALIATION
In two phone calls with Putin, Biden warned of severe consequences if Russia invades Ukraine.
Measures under consideration include sanctions on Putin’s inner circle, cancelling Russia’s controversial Nord Stream 2 pipeline to Germany or, in the most drastic scenario, severing Russia’s links to the world’s banking system.
A US official, speaking on condition of anonymity, warned that Washington would also send more troops to eastern NATO members such as Poland and the Baltics if Russia invaded.
Europeans have showed solidarity, with European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell visiting the frontline in Ukraine, although some nations are expected to hesitate at the strongest measures.
“Whatever the solution, Europe has to be involved,” EU Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen said.
Russia insists that it was deceived after the Cold War and understood that NATO would not expand.
Instead, the US-led alliance accepted most of the former Warsaw Pact nations and the three Baltic nations that were under Soviet rule.
Russia has inflicted intense pressure on neighbouring Ukraine since 2014, after a revolution overthrew a government that had sided with the Kremlin against moving closer to Europe.
Russia seized the Crimean peninsula and backs an insurgency in eastern Ukraine in which more than 13,000 people have died.
At a time that Russia is also intervening to shore up allies facing popular uprisings in Belarus and Kazakhstan, Moscow has insisted that it wants concrete progress in talks with Washington.
Putin’s foreign policy adviser Yury Ushakov warned after the call with Biden that the United States would make a “colossal mistake” if it went ahead with sanctions.
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