Kremlin rejects possibility of U.S. joining Donbas talks
U.S. policy towards Ukraine precludes this country from joining the "Normandy format" negotiations to resolve the situation in the Donbas, said Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, RIA Novosti reports.
"With the approaches that Washington demonstrates and applies, it has no business in the Normandy format," Ryabkov said, commenting on the words of Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Oleksii Reznikov that Kyiv is interested in involving the United States and Poland in the negotiations.
The head of the Ukrainian delegation to the Trilateral Contact Group Leonid Kravchuk said that the United States is the only country that can force Russia to fulfill its obligations.
Last week, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the U.S. Army, General Mark Milley, General Mark Milley, held talks with Valery Gerasimov, Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces.
"We have made it clear that we see threats from Russia and take them very, very seriously," Pentagon spokesman John Kirby later said.
He added that Washington would like Moscow to be "more open" about the troop movements. "While we have learned from the bitter experience to not take at face value the Russians' statements about their intentions," Kirby said.
NATO troops in the next few months will hold exercises in Ukraine, the scenario of which will be "to repel a large-scale offensive of the armed forces of the hypothetical aggressor country," the Ukrainian General Staff said.
"The defensive actions will transition to subsequent offensive to restore the state border and territorial integrity amid the aggression by the neighboring state," the Ukrainian General Staff said.