Ukraine Calls for U.N. Security Council Meeting as Russian Forces Mass on Borders – WSJ

MOSCOW Ukraine asked the United Nations Security Council for an urgent meeting to tackle the threat of a Russian invasion as Russian President Vladimir Putin said he was weighing whether to recognize two Russian-led breakaway regions in Ukraine, a move that could be used to justify an incursion.

Ukraine s foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, said he made the request Monday after a dramatic escalation in military activity between Russian-backed forces and Kyiv government troops.

Mr. Putin said he would make a decision on Monday on whether to recognize the independence of the self-proclaimed republics of Donetsk and Luhansk in the eastern Donbas region of Ukraine after listening to several senior government officials make statements in favor of such a move.

These issues are very closely related to the global problems of ensuring security in the world in general and on the European continent in particular, Mr. Putin told a meeting of his Security Council.

Last week, Russian legislators voted to send a resolution directly to Mr. Putin urging him to formally recognize the largely Russian-speaking regions, where in 2014 Moscow fomented a separatist conflict and then covertly sent military units there to pry them from Kyiv s control.

A decision to award recognition would grant the Kremlin greater sway over these regions, already proxies of Moscow, and hand Mr. Putin an additional trump card in negotiations in his current standoff with the West over the long-term security of Eastern Europe.

Tensions have been steadily rising across the region.

On Monday, Russia s military said it destroyed two Ukrainian armored vehicles and killed five Ukrainian personnel inside Russian territory Monday, but offered no evidence of the alleged incursion, as Ukrainian and Western leaders warned Moscow was seeking pretexts to mount an attack.

Ukrainian military spokesman Lt. Col. Pavlo Kovalchuk said no such incident occurred. It never existed, he said. This whole false claim of a Ukrainian sabotage and reconnaissance team being caught somewhere near the Russian border is completely false&There are no Ukrainian service members that are missing in action across the Russian border, he said.

via www.wsj.com