Biden-Putin Meeting: Starts with “Greetings Mr President”, Ends with Ukraine’s Tension

By Staff, Agencies

US President Joe Biden warned his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin against any “military escalation” with Ukraine, as the two leaders held direct talks amid weeks of rising tensions over Russia’s military buildup near the Ukrainian border.

“Greetings, Mr President,” Putin said in a brief video clip released by the Kremlin from Tuesday’s virtual meeting between the two leaders, which the White House said lasted for just over two hours.

Biden said it was “good to see” the Russian president, adding that he hoped their next session would be in person.

In a statement after the call, the White House said Biden “voiced the deep concern” of the United States and its European allies “about Russia’s escalation of forces surrounding Ukraine” and made clear they “would respond with strong economic and other measures in the event of military escalation”.

“President Biden reiterated his support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity and called for de-escalation and a return to diplomacy. The two presidents tasked their teams to follow up, and the US will do so in close coordination with allies and partners,” the statement said.

Ukraine has said 94,000 Russian troops are massed along the border in the second such buildup so far this year, prompting a slew of warnings from top Biden administration officials seeking to deter Moscow from taking “significant aggressive moves” against Kyiv.

Biden said in advance of the summit that he was prepared to warn Putin of “high impact economic measures” if Moscow decided to invade Ukraine, instead urging the Russian president to take a diplomatic path.

For his part, Putin on Tuesday presented the US president with a demand for legally binding security guarantees that would rule out the expansion of NATO, the Kremlin said after the call.

Putin said NATO was bolstering its military potential near Russia’s borders and “making dangerous attempts to conquer Ukrainian territory”, the Kremlin said in a statement. “Therefore, Russia is seriously interested in obtaining reliable, legally fixed guarantees that rule out NATO expansion eastward and the deployment of offensive strike weapons systems in states adjacent to Russia.”

Biden administration officials have dismissed that demand, noting that only NATO members decide when other nations join the security alliance. “NATO member countries decide who is a member of NATO, not Russia. And that is how the process has always been and how it will proceed,” White House press secretary Jen Psaki said on Monday.

In Moscow earlier on Tuesday, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov said “Russia has never planned to attack anyone. But we have our own concerns, our own red lines – the president spoke clearly about that”.

“Putin has repeatedly said that we look for good, predictable relations with the US,” Peskov told reporters, warning that US-Russia relations were, however, in “a rather dire state” and “quite lamentable”.