{"id":10292,"date":"2014-04-01T15:03:38","date_gmt":"2014-04-01T15:03:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/4cd.e16.myftpupload.com\/?p=10292"},"modified":"2014-04-01T15:03:38","modified_gmt":"2014-04-01T15:03:38","slug":"no-sign-of-russian-pullback-from-ukraine","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=10292","title":{"rendered":"‘No sign’ of Russian pullback from Ukraine"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Diplomats<\/a>
Diplomats said the ministers would consider options ranging from stepped-up military exercises<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

NATO has seen no sign that Russia is withdrawing troops from the Ukraine border and will look at all options to boost the alliance’s defences, its secretary-general said.<\/p>\n

“Unfortunately, I cannot confirm that Russia is withdrawing\u00a0its troops. This is not what we are seeing,” Anders Fogh Rasmussen told reporters at a meeting of NATO’s members in Brussels, according to the Reuters news agency.<\/p>\n

Ministers from the 28 alliance members are meeting for the first time since Russia’s military occupation and annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea region triggered the worst East-West crisis since the Cold War.<\/p>\n

They will discuss ways to boost NATO’s military presence in\u00a0former communist central and eastern Europe to reassure allies\u00a0rattled by Russia’s moves.<\/p>\n

The meeting came as Russian energy giant Gazprom announced a more than\u00a040 percent increase<\/a>\u00a0in the price of gas exports to Ukraine, scrapping a previous discount amid mounting strains between the two countries.<\/p>\n

Ukraine will now pay a price of $385.5 per 1,000 cubic metres of gas, Gazprom chief executive Alexei Miller said in a statement on Tuesday,\u00a0raising the price from $268.5 per 1,000 cubic metres which was agreed in December.<\/p>\n

Diplomats said the ministers in Brussels would consider options ranging\u00a0from stepped-up military exercises and sending more forces to\u00a0eastern member states to the permanent bases of alliance forces\u00a0in those countries – a step Moscow would view as provocative.<\/p>\n

Asked if NATO could station forces permanently in the small\u00a0former Soviet Baltic states, Rasmussen said: “We are now\u00a0considering all options to enhance our collective defence,\u00a0including … further development of our defence plans, enhanced\u00a0exercises and also appropriate deployments.”<\/p>\n

Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski told reporters as\u00a0he arrived that he would welcome “some more prominent NATO\u00a0presence in Poland”.<\/p>\n

Financial aid<\/strong><\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the European Union has decided to make a swift payment of financial aid to Ukraine, the bloc’s economy chief Olli Rehn\u00a0said, dismissing the possibility of economic sanctions against Russia unless it takes more action.<\/p>\n

Rehn’s comments on Tuesday offered the prospect of quick financial backing from Europe for Ukraine, which is grappling with increased gas prices.<\/p>\n

The European Union has pledged 11 billion euros as part of a package of support with the International Monetary Fund.<\/p>\n

“It is in the interests of Ukraine and Europe to maintain peace and stability on our continent,” Rehn told journalists on the sidelines of a meeting of European finance ministers in Athens.<\/p>\n

He said the first payment would be “made swiftly”, according to the Reuters news agency.<\/p>\n

But while he underscored Brussels’ desire to back Ukraine, he played down the idea of stiffer penalties on Russia following\u00a0its annexation of the Ukraine’s Crimea.<\/p>\n

“As regards sanctions, no sensible European would want to see economic sanctions,” he said, adding that none should be necessary if Moscow took no action.<\/p>\n

“In case Russia would not escalate the crisis, then we should be able to avoid this sanctions,” he said.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Source: Aljazeera<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

NATO has seen no sign that Russia is withdrawing troops from the Ukraine border and will look at all options to boost the alliance’s defences, its secretary-general said. “Unfortunately, I cannot confirm that Russia is withdrawing\u00a0its troops. This is not what we are seeing,” Anders Fogh Rasmussen told reporters at a meeting of NATO’s members […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":10296,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[14],"class_list":["post-10292","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-papa-owusu-ankomah"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10292","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10292"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10292\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10296"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10292"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10292"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10292"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}