UNITED NATIONS (AP) — The United States and Russia are squaring off at the U.N. Security Council over Ukraine, with Washington calling Moscow’s actions a threat to international peace and security.
A Kremlin envoy ridiculed Monday’s meeting as a “PR stunt.”
Diplomatic talks between the U.S. and Russia have so far failed to ease tensions in the crisis, in which Russia has massed an estimated 100,000 troops near Ukraine’s border, stoking fears in the West of an invasion.
Russia denies it intends to launch an attack but demanded that NATO promise never to allow Ukraine to join the alliance, halt the deployment of NATO weapons near Russian borders, and roll back its forces from Eastern Europe.
NATO and the U.S. call those demands impossible.