Alarming Russian escalation after week of security talks reaches stalemate

Between January 9 and 15, the Joint Forces Operation reported that Russian-backed forces committed 12 ceasefire violations in eastern Ukraine. As a result of occupation aggression, 2 Ukrainian soldiers were injured and 3 killed over the past week.

As Moscow continues to build up forces on the Ukrainian border, a series of high-stakes meetings with Russia last week ended in an impasse. On January 10, a bilateral extraordinary session of the US-Russia Strategic Stability Dialogue met in Geneva. After US Deputy Secretary of State Wendy Sherman met with her counterpart, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov, for over seven hours during this meeting, Sherman stated that she remained doubtful of the Kremlin’s commitment to diplomatic negotiations. Two days later, the NATO-Russia Council met in Brussels for the first time in two years. During this meeting, the US and NATO again resolutely rejected Moscow’s security demands, which Sherman declared “are simply non-starters.” NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg noted that both sides were eyeing further dialogue.

On January 13, a third round of talks were held as the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) met in Vienna. At the meeting, US Ambassador to the OSCE Michael Carpenter firmly stated: “We must decisively reject blackmail and never allow aggression and threats to be rewarded.” Russia’s envoy OSCE, Alexander Lukashevich, responded after the meeting: “If we don’t hear a constructive response to our proposals within a reasonable time frame and an aggressive line of behavior towards Russia continues, we will be forced to draw appropriate conclusions and take all necessary measures to ensure strategic balance and eliminate unacceptable threats to our national security.”

On the night of January 13 into the 14, Ukraine was hit by a major cyberattack that the Ministry of Digital Transportation has accused Russia of being responsible for. This attack crashed several Ukrainian government websites, including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Energy, State Emergency Service, and Cabinet of Ministers. Before the targeted sites were shut down by 9am on Jan 14, the homepages had been replaced with a threatening message addressed to Ukrainians that said: “All information about you has become public, be afraid and expect worse.” That same day, the Defense Intelligence of Ukraine reported that Russian-led militants released toxic ammonia gas in the occupied city of Horlivka in Donetsk. Ukrainian and US intelligence have both warned that Moscow could use this latest attack as a “false-flag operation”—a pretense for invasion.