German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock said on Monday that she hoped mounting tensions with Russia over Ukraine could be solved by diplomacy but she warned that Moscow would suffer if it does attack the country.
“Each further aggressive act will have a high price for Russia, economically, strategically, politically,” Baerbock told a joint news conference with her Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba.
“Diplomacy is the only way.”
Talks on Russia’s deployment of tens of thousands of troops along Ukraine’s border between the United States, its European allies and Russia ended in a stalemate last week. A cyber attack against Ukraine has further inflamed tensions.
PEACE TALKS
Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba, on the other hand, said at the briefing that, Ukraine and Germany are pushing to revive four-way peace talks with Russia and France to end the conflict in Ukraine’s eastern Donbass region.
Kuleba said it was important that Germany and France did not take decisions about Ukraine behind Ukraine’s back.
“It is important for us now that neither Berlin nor Paris makes any decisions about Ukraine without Ukraine, and does not play any game behind our backs in relations with Russia. This is the key now,” Kuleba said at the briefing.
“For this I want to thank Annalena for taking such a principled position.”
Kyiv and its Western allies have sounded the alarm about Russia massing tens of thousands of troops near its borders in preparation for a possible military offensive. Talks between Moscow and the United States have produced no breakthrough so far.
