Washington secretary says diplomacy has chance to avoid Ukraine war

Washington Secretary of State Antony Blinken said on Sunday that Russia’s “action manual” for an invasion of Ukraine was moving forward, although he said there was still a chance for diplomacy to avert war.

“As we’ve described, everything leading up to the actual invasion appears to be taking place,” Blinken said on the “State of the Union” program. CNN International.

Ukraine’s Defense Ministry reported more than 100 ceasefire violations in eastern Ukraine the day before (19), and said shelling continued on Sunday, while Russian troops remained in Belarus to continue military exercises that should have been carried out. completed.

Blinken highlighted that he is concerned that the extent of the exercises was another sign that Russia was laying the groundwork for an invasion, following “false flag” operations this week and the build-up of more than 150,000 Russian forces along Ukraine’s border. .

“Now they are justifying the continuation of the ‘exercises’ that they said they would now end,” said the Washington secretary of state. “The continuation raises tensions.”

Still, Blinken said the US will continue to try to find a last diplomatic path. According to the secretary, President Joe Biden is willing to talk to Russian President Vladimir Putin “at any time, in any format” if it helps to avoid a war. He declares that the Biden administration will continue to take whatever steps it can to try to convince Moscow not to invade Ukraine.

“We believe that President Putin has made the decision, but until the tanks are actually rolling and the planes are flying, we will use every opportunity and every minute we have to see if diplomacy can still dissuade President Putin from taking this further.” said Blinken.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was in Germany on Saturday, where he met with Vice President Kamala Harris at the Munich Security Conference. Zelensky said he was asking the US and Europe not to wait to put in place sanctions against Russia, arguing that they would not help Ukraine if they were invoked only after an invasion had already begun.

Blinken argued that the US does not want to reveal sanctions in advance because that would “allow Russia to try to plan against them”.

“The purpose of sanctions in the first instance is to try to stop Russia from going to war,” the secretary said. “As soon as you trigger them, that impediment is gone and until the last minute, as long as we can try to bring a deterrent effect to this, let’s try to do it.”

Blinken pointed out that if Putin goes ahead with an invasion, the US and NATO (North Atlantic Treaty Organization) have made it clear that “they are going to attack him and Russia very, very hard.”

Asked if Putin could be bluffing, Blinken said: “There is always a chance, but every indication we saw, every move he made followed the game we presented for the world to see. He is following the script almost to the letter.”

“Everything we are seeing suggests that this is very serious, that we are on the verge of an invasion,” he added.

Finnish President Sauli Niinistö told Bash in a separate interview that Putin “behaved in a way that is very difficult to predict”.

“It is very difficult to say and define what the other person really is, deep down. But so far, I would say that she has behaved in a way that is very difficult to predict, which could also be intentional, because that brings confusion. [e tensão] environment”, highlighted the president of Finland.

Blinken is due to meet Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Europe later this week in what would be another round of diplomatic talks that have been going on for weeks as Russian troops continue to focus on the Ukrainian border. But Blinken said the meeting would be canceled in the event of a break-in.

“It all depends on what Russia does in the next few days,” he said. “If you don’t invade, I’ll be [na reunião].”

*With input from CNN’s Manveena Suri