Russia expels US deputy ambassador, and Washington may respond to the decision

Russia expelled Deputy US Ambassador Bartle Gorman and Washington will respond to the actaccording to information given by the US embassy in Moscow on Thursday (17), according to the RIA news agency.

Moscow’s justification for the expulsion is unclear at the moment, and the White House said the act was “unjustified”.

Also on Thursday, US President Joe Biden warned of a “very high” risk of Russian invasion of Ukraine. The situation on the Ukraine-Russia border has been watched by Western leaders, who are considering the possibility of Vladimir Putin’s army invading the neighboring country.

Speaking to reporters as he left the White House, Biden said there was “every indication that they are prepared to enter Ukraine” and that there was no plan for him to call the Russian president.

Moscow denies having any intentions of proceeding with an invasion. In late January, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov went so far as to say that the information coming from the West is full of “hysteria” and “laden with lies”. He also claimed at the time that the chance of a conflict being started by the Ukrainian side was “greater than ever before”.

“We want [uma guerra], or not? Of course not. That is why we present our proposals for a negotiation process,” Putin said in a speech alongside German Chancellor Olaf Scholz on Tuesday (15).

Russia’s Defense Ministry said its forces were retreating after exercises near Ukraine. However, the United States and NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) claim that Russian forces continue to accumulate near the border.

Russian Foreign Ministry website crashes

The Russian Foreign Ministry website went down on Thursday, a ministry official told Reuters, the same day Russia submitted its response to Western security proposals.

TASS news agency quoted the ministry as saying the site was down for an hour for technical reasons. The official did not say why the site was oscillating.