Moscow - Russian President Vladimir Putin and U.S. President Joe Biden held a telephone call on Saturday for an hour, as tensions mount over a possibility of Ukraine invasion escalated. The U.S. announced plans to evacuate its embassy in the Ukrainian capital.
Biden told Putin that the West would respond decisively to any invasion of Ukraine, adding such a step would produce widespread suffering and isolate Moscow.
In the latest effort to avert hostilities, the leaders spoke by phone a day after Washington and its allies warned Russian forces could invade at any moment. A senior Biden administration official said the call was professional and substantive, but said there was no fundamental change reported Reuters.
Putin is to have a call with French President Emmanuel Macron, who met with him in Moscow earlier in the week, before his call to Biden.
Russia has massed well over 100,000 troops near the Ukraine border and has sent troops to exercises in neighboring Belarus, but insistently denies that it intends to launch an offensive against Ukraine.
Australia, New Zealand, Germany and the Netherlands on Saturday joined countries urging their citizens to leave Ukraine. Britain on Saturday told its citizens to leave Ukraine.
Washington ordered some embassy staff to leave Ukraine on Saturday, following its call this week for citizens to leave the country as soon as possible. read more
Maria Zakharova, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said on Saturday that the country has “optimized” staffing at its embassy in Kyiv. The move is in response to concerns about possible military actions from the Ukrainian side.
The White House has publicly underscored that the U.S. does not know with certainty whether Putin is committed to invasion.
Biden has said U.S. troops will not enter Ukraine to contest any Russian invasion. However, he has reinforced the U.S. military presence in Europe as reassurance to allies on NATO’s eastern flank. On Friday the Pentagon said it was decided to send a further 3,000 soldiers to Poland, on top of 1,700 who are on their way there. The U.S. Army also is shifting 1,000 soldiers from Germany to Romania, which like Poland shares a border with Ukraine.
Ahead of the talks with Putin, Biden spoke about the crisis with the leaders of Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Poland and Romania, as well as the heads of NATO and the EU. As the tensions have risen in recent weeks, Washington has sought to ensure that its allies would respond in unison if Russia does invade.
Two calls in December between Biden and Putin produced no breakthroughs but set the stage for diplomacy between their aides. The two leaders have not spoken since, and diplomats from both sides have struggled to find common ground.
Four-way talks in Berlin between Russia, Ukraine, Germany and France on Thursday made no progress.
-Reuters/Ap