U.S. at OSCE: Russia has mobilized 85 battalion tactical groups near Ukraine

Russia has mobilized 85 heavily armed battalion tactical groups on Ukraine's borders, according to Ambassador Michael Carpenter, U.S. Permanent Representative to the OSCE.

He said this at a meeting of the OSCE Permanent Council in Vienna on Thursday, February 10, according to an Ukrinform correspondent.

"Our serious concerns about the large number of Russian troops massed in and around Ukraine have not abated. Just the opposite. Russia's denial that it has any aggressive intentions related to this unrelenting buildup continues to defy the reality we see on the ground. Russia has mobilized 85 heavily armed Battalion Tactical Groups in an unprecedented and unprovoked build-up on Ukraine's borders," Carpenter said.

He added that Russia's forces are also now positioned along the Belarus-Ukraine border, less than two hours north of Kyiv, with plans for more than 30,000 troops to be staged for a potential offensive into Ukraine, along with short-range ballistic missiles, anti-aircraft batteries, attack helicopters, fighter planes, and S-400 air defense systems.

"We see Russia escalating its brinksmanship by conducting provocative exercises along Ukraine's borders and in occupied Crimea, as well as in the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, as was mentioned by several of the preceding speakers. This chokes off commercial traffic in both bodies of water," he said.

At the same time, he noted that the Ukrainian government and the Ukrainian Armed Forces continued "to show tremendous restraint in the face of these provocations."

Russia continues to build up its forces in the temporarily occupied territories of Ukraine and around Ukraine's borders. The Kremlin is using these military maneuvers to blackmail the United States and NATO, putting forward an ultimatum demanding guarantees of NATO eastward non-expansion and the reversal of the allies' security policy. Should the West refuse to accept such Russian "offers," the Kremlin publicly threatens to respond with "military and military-technical" measures.

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