Secretary of State Antony Blinken plans to meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Friday as the US seeks to ward off an invasion of Ukraine by Russia, which has amassed 100,000 troops on the border with Ukraine and recently moved forces to Belarus for joint military drills.
The meeting follows high-level diplomatic talks between the US and Russian officials and NATO in Europe last week. Blinken and Lavrov spoke by phone on Tuesday and agreed to meet.
Blinken plans to urge the Russians to deescalate the situation and take the diplomatic path offered by the US and its allies, Psaki said, reiterating that there would be significant economic consequences should Russia choose to invade Ukraine.
“It is up to the Russians to determine which path they are going to take, and the consequences are going to be severe if they don’t take the diplomatic path,” Psaki said.
President Joe Biden told Russian President Vladimir Putin on a video call in December that Russia would face sanctions if it invaded Ukraine and that the US would move to bolster NATO’s eastern flank and increase military aid to Ukraine in the event of an invasion.
Psaki on Tuesday disputed reports that cutting Russia off from the SWIFT global banking system was off the table.
“No option is off the table, in our view,” she said.
As of last week, White House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan said the US intelligence community had not assessed whether Putin has made his mind up on invading Ukraine but nevertheless characterized the threat as high.
US officials last week said they have evidence of Russia laying the groundwork for a false flag operation that could serve as a pretext for invading Ukraine.
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