Main topic of CIA director's visit to Moscow was situation around Ukraine - CNN

"President Joe Biden dispatched CIA Director Bill Burns to Moscow earlier this week to warn the Kremlin that the U.S. is watching its buildup of troops near Ukraine's border closely, and to attempt to determine what is motivating Russia's actions," the report reads.

Burns held talks in Moscow with senior Kremlin security officials directly involved in the military activity. At the same time, CNN called the CIA chief's trip to Moscow "rare" and stressed that it came as the U.S. has grown increasingly concerned by Russia's irregular movement of troops and equipment near Ukraine's northern border.

The Biden administration has ramped up its efforts in recent days to de-escalate growing tensions between Moscow and Kyiv. Following his meetings in Russia, Burns spoke to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky by phone in an attempt to diffuse those tensions, the sources told CNN. A senior State Department official was also dispatched to Kyiv on November 4 to support those efforts.

"The flurry of high-level diplomacy underscores how seriously the Biden administration is taking the latest Russian troop movements," the report said. It also says that tensions between Ukraine and Russia have also been exacerbated in recent weeks by a deepening Ukrainian energy crisis that Kyiv believes Moscow has purposefully provoked.

U.S. congressmen Mike Rogers and Mike Turner sent a letter to President Joe Biden on Friday, November 5, calling on him to provide Ukraine with more weapons and to "deploy a U.S. military presence in the Black Sea" amid Russia's military aggression.

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