US president Joe Biden. AP Photo/Andrew Harnik
The human cost of an invasion of Ukraine by Russia would be “immense”, US president Joe Biden has warned.
In a speech published by the White House, Biden also said a move by Kremlin would be responded to with “overwhelming international condemnation”.
He said: “If Russia does invade in the days or weeks ahead, the human cost for Ukraine will be immense, and the strategic cost for Russia will also be immense.
“If Russia attacks Ukraine, it’ll be met with overwhelming international condemnation. The world will not forget that Russia chose needless death and destruction.”
Biden’s comments come as Russia’s Defence Ministry said some military units were pulling back from Ukraine’s border.
But the American president said the US has not yet verified that the units are returning to their home bases, and warned an invasion “remains distinctly possible”.
He added: “Our analysts indicate that they remain very much in a threatening position. And the fact remains: Right now, Russia has more than 150,000 troops encircling Ukraine in Belarus and along Ukraine’s border.
“We are ready to respond decisively to a Russian attack on Ukraine, which is still very much a possibility.”
“And make no mistake: The United States will defend every inch of NATO territory with the full force of American power. An attack against one NATO country is an attack against all of us.”
Biden said that, although US troops have not been sent to Ukraine to fight Russia in the event of an incursion, it supplied military equipment to the Ukrainian army and offered them training, advice and intelligence to “help them defend themselves”.
But he said one punishment for Russia should it invade Ukraine would be not switching on Nord Stream 2, a pipeline which was set to provide natural gas to Germany from Russia.
Meanwhile, he announced the US has put forward concrete measures which would improve European security and could de-escalate the current situation.
“We’re proposing new arms control measures, new transparency measures, new strategic stability measures. These measures would apply to all parties — NATO and Russia alike,” Biden concluded.
Biden’s speech comes after Russia said Moscow-Washington relationships were “on the floor”, according to Reuters.
The remarks were triggered by increased American military presence in Europe.
And although Russia acknowledged the benefit of Biden’s recent conversation with Russian president Vladimir Putin, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov warned relations between the two world powers are at a “very, very low point”.
Russia has also accused the West of “hysteria” – with Peskov saying it is “being intentionally whipped up”.
“We are being accused of some sort of unusual military activity on our territory by those who brought in their troops from across the ocean,” he said, pointing to the US.
“This neither exactly logical nor exactly polite,” he concluded, according to DW.
Related: Ukraine gran plastered across UK media was sent by ‘neo-Nazi group’
