- Russian President Vladimir Putin and his French counterpart Emmanuel Macron have discussed the increasing tensions in Europe in Moscow.
- In the US, President Joe Biden held talks with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz.
In Ukraine there are great concerns about a Russian invasion. Moscow denies such plans. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz met US President Joe Biden in Washington. At the same time, French head of state Emmanuel Macron tried to reduce tensions with Vladimir Putin in the Kremlin until late in the afternoon.
Germany is one of his country’s closest allies, said US President Joe Biden on Monday at the reception of Chancellor Olaf Scholz in the White House. Together they want to prevent Russia from aggression against Ukraine.
After returning from the USA, Scholz is expected in Kiev next week and then in the Kremlin. The chancellor has been accused by NATO partners in Eastern Europe – but also by the USA – of not putting enough pressure on Russia. In Ukraine and among eastern NATO partners, he is resented that Berlin is refusing to deliver arms to Ukraine. There is still massive criticism in the USA of the Nord Stream 2 Baltic Sea pipeline, which is intended to bring gas directly from Russia to Germany, bypassing Ukraine.
Macron and Putin without a “big breakthrough”
The meeting between Emmanuel Macron and Russian President Vladimir Putin went as expected without any major breakthrough. Putin thanked Macron in the Kremlin for his commitment to European security. France has also been working for years to find a solution to the Ukraine conflict, he said.
Russia’s demands for Western guarantees for its own security have meanwhile triggered a broad debate in Europe. After the appointment in the Kremlin, Macron wants to travel to Ukraine on Tuesday and then to Berlin.
More troops
Russia, which is demanding a new security architecture for Europe from the US and NATO, continued to move troops to neighboring Belarus – to the Brest region, near the borders with Poland and Ukraine. A major military maneuver begins there on Thursday.
The deployment near Ukraine is seen as a threat to obtain concessions from the West. However, the military emphasizes that the exercises do not pose a threat to anyone and are in accordance with international law. As a reaction, the first of 2,000 additional US soldiers that had been announced landed in Germany and Poland at the weekend. 1,000 US soldiers are to be transferred from Germany to Romania. The declared goal is to strengthen NATO’s eastern flank.
US military trains in radioactive zone
The US Department of Defense said Russia was being shown a path from the crisis to more security. “There is still time and space for diplomacy,” Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin said on Twitter. In the Ukraine, the military is now also practicing house-to-house combat in the radioactively contaminated zone around the former Chernobyl nuclear power plant.
There is still time and space for diplomacy.
Russian politicians, on the other hand, accused the West of holding a competition in the production of endless loops of fake news. A US media report that an invasion had already begun caused outrage in Moscow. The US medium apologized and spoke of an accident.