Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba says Russia will soon have more than 120,000 troops on Ukraine’s border, and called for new Western economic sanctions to deter Moscow from further escalation.
Addressing an online news conference, Kuleba said Russian troops have continued to arrive in close proximity to their borders in the northeast, in the east and in the south.
He said that In about a week, they are expected to reach a combined force of over 120,000 troops, warning of what he said was Moscow’s unpredictability although he said Ukraine did not want conflict with Russia.
The figure given by Kuleba is higher than Ukraine’s previous estimate of 80,000 Russian troops, of which 50,000 were new deployments and Western officials say the concentration of forces is now larger than during that annexation.
Washington and NATO have been alarmed by the large build-up of Russian troops near Ukraine and in Crimea, the peninsula that Moscow annexed from Ukraine in 2014.
Kuleba also called for Moscow to re-commit to a ceasefire in eastern Ukraine, where Russian-backed forces have fought Ukrainian troops in a conflict that has reportedly claimed 14,000 lives since 2014.
Russia has said its troop build-up is a three-week snap military drill to test combat readiness in response to what it calls threatening behaviour from NATO.
Moscow on Tuesday also accused the U.S. and NATO of “provocative activity” in the waters and airspace of the Black Sea.
Discover more from LN247
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
