Ukraine's foreign minister, US state secretary discuss ways to stop Russia

By Jeyhun Aliyev

KRAMATORSK, Ukraine (AA) - Ukraine's Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken discussed over the phone the "ways to stop Russia’s brutal war of aggression" against Ukraine.

"Secretary informed me on the new U.S. sanctions on Russia, as well as plans to deliver new defensive weapons to help Ukraine defend itself," Kuleba said on Twitter.

"Ukraine holds ground," he said, adding that Ukraine needs the world to help the country.

The February 2014 “Maidan revolution” in Ukraine led to former President Viktor Yanukovych fleeing the country and a pro-Western government coming to power.

That was followed by Russia's illegal annexation of the Crimea region and separatists' declarations of independence in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions of Donbas in eastern Ukraine, both of which have large ethnic Russian populations.

As clashes erupted between Russian-backed separatist forces and the Ukrainian army, the 2014 and 2015 Minsk agreements were signed in Moscow after the intervention of Western powers.

The conflict, however, simmered for years with persistent cease-fire violations. As of February 2022, some 14,000 people have been killed in the conflict in eastern Ukraine.

Tensions started escalating late last year when Ukraine, the US and its allies accused Russia of amassing tens of thousands of troops on the border with Ukraine.

They claimed Russia was preparing to invade its western neighbor, allegations that were consistently rejected by Moscow.

Defying threats of sanctions by the West, Moscow officially recognized Donetsk and Luhansk as independent states earlier this week, followed by the start of a military operation in Ukraine on Thursday.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said the operation aims to protect people “subjected to genocide” by Kyiv and to “demilitarize and denazify” Ukraine, while calling on the Ukrainian army to lay down its arms.