Washington ordered some embassy staff to leave Ukraine on Saturday
\n WASHINGTON\/MOSCOW
\nUS President Joe Biden and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin will speak on Saturday as the United States and other Western nations warned a war in Ukraine could ignite at any moment.
\nWashington ordered most of its embassy staff to leave Ukraine on Saturday, adding to its call this week for private citizens to leave the country as soon as possible.
\nAdditionally, about 150 troops from the Florida National Guard who are in Ukraine to help train Ukrainian forces are leaving the country as the threat of a Russian invasion increases, two US officials told Reuters.
\nRussia\u2019s military buildup near Ukraine and a surge of military activity has fuelled fears that Russia could invade. Russia denies having any such plans. Putin requested the telephone call between the leaders to take place on Monday, a White House official said, but Biden wanted to conduct it sooner as Washington detailed increasingly vivid accounts of a possible attack on Ukraine.
\nAustralia, New Zealand, Germany, Italy and the Netherlands on Saturday joined countries urging their citizens to leave Ukraine. Washington said on Friday that a Russian invasion, including a possible air assault, could occur anytime.
\nMoscow has repeatedly disputed Washington\u2019s version of events, saying it has massed more than 100,000 troops near the Ukrainian border to maintain its own security against aggression by NATO allies.
\nRussia, which has accused Western nations of spreading lies, meanwhile said on Saturday it had decided to \u201coptimise\u201d its diplomatic staff numbers in Ukraine, fearing \u201cprovocations\u201d by Kyiv or another party.
\nMoscow did not say whether that meant a reduction in staff numbers but said the embassy and consulates in Ukraine continued to perform their key functions.
\nUS Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Washington would impose swift economic sanctions if Moscow invades.
\n\u201cI continue to hope that he will not choose the path of renewed aggression and he\u2019ll chose the path of diplomacy and dialogue,\u201d Blinken told reporters after a meeting with Pacific leaders in Fiji. \u201cBut if he doesn\u2019t, we\u2019re prepared.\u201d
\nIn a phone call later with Blinken, Russia\u2019s top diplomat Sergei Lavrov accused the United States and its allies of waging a \u201cpropaganda campaign\u201d about Russian aggression towards Ukraine, the Russian foreign ministry said.
\nRussian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu and his US counterpart Lloyd Austin also talked by phone on Saturday, Interfax news agency and the Pentagon said.
\nSecurity guarantees
\nPutin, jostling for influence in post-Cold War Europe, is seeking security guarantees from Biden to block Kyiv\u2019s entry into NATO and missile deployments near Russia\u2019s borders.
\nWashington regards many of the proposals as non-starters but has pushed the Kremlin to discuss them jointly with Washington and its European allies.
\nStill, Biden has long believed that one-on-one engagement with Putin may be the best chance at a resolution. Two calls in December between Biden and Putin produced no breakthroughs but set the stage for diplomacy between their aides.
\nThe two leaders have not spoken since, and diplomats from both sides have struggled to find common ground.
\nFour-way talks in Berlin between Russia, Ukraine, Germany and France on Thursday made no progress.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Washington ordered some embassy staff to leave Ukraine on Saturday WASHINGTON\/MOSCOW US President Joe Biden and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin will speak on Saturday as the United States and other Western nations warned a war in Ukraine could ignite at any moment. Washington ordered most of its embassy staff to leave Ukraine on Saturday, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":244145,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[503,4029,456,633],"class_list":{"0":"post-244115","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world","8":"tag-joe-biden","9":"tag-mount","10":"tag-ukraine","11":"tag-vladimir-putin"},"yoast_head":"\n