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Many analysts believe that the coming days will be crucial to understanding whether Russia will invade Ukraine, as it has deployed thousands of troops on the border for weeks.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is scheduled to pay a visit to Russia on Tuesday, February 15. This will be the last meeting, which follows a series of meetings and phone calls between President Vladimir Putin and other Western leaders, which so far have not produced any specific agreement or development.
“Scholz may be the last Western leader to have the opportunity to speak personally with Putin and persuade him not to launch an attack“, Writes Politico. However, German officials are trying to lower expectations from the meeting, stressing that the main objective will be to keep the dialogue between the West and Putin open.
February 16, on the other hand, was hailed by some US and European officials as the most likely day for Russia to launch an invasion of Ukraine, although it is not yet clear on what basis they have relied.
That the situation has further deteriorated in recent days is quite clear: Western embassies in Ukraine are being emptied, although only two days ago High Representative for Foreign Affairs Josep Borrell stressed that they will remain active, while airlines are avoid Ukrainian airspace, and have canceled flights to Kiev.
Another date to keep in mind will be Sunday, February 20th. This is the day when the Russian and Belarusian military exercises in Belarus will theoretically end, which according to some Western analysts could open a northern front in case of an invasion of Ukraine.
In late January, a Bloomberg source had speculated that China, Russia’s most important international ally, had asked Putin to wait for the end of the Olympics to invade Ukraine, as it would overshadow their success. The Chinese government categorically denied such a hypothesis, but it continued to be considered by several other analysts.
By the end of the week, writes the Associated Press, Western leaders are waiting for an official response from Russia, as NATO considered the demands of the Russian government unacceptable. It is unclear whether Putin expected to receive a response from the 60-minute phone call he had with Biden, but the administration of the latter clarified that the telephone conversation between the two did not yield any concrete development.
“It gave us no reason to be optimisticWhite House National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan added.
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