Russian forces stay in Belarus; Biden convenes NSC about invasion threat

The U.S. Embassy in Moscow released a security alert on Sunday, telling Americans to avoid crowds and have evacuation plans.

The embassy advised Americans to “review your personal security plans” and “have evacuation plans that do not rely on U.S. government assistance.”

It also cautioned Americans to “stay alert in locations frequented by tourists/Westerners” and to carry proper identification including a U.S. passport with a Russian visa.

The embassy, which cited “media sources” without giving specifics, said there had been “threats of attacks against shopping centers, railway and metro stations and other public gathering places in major urban areas,” including Moscow and St. Petersburg, as well as in areas of tension along the border with Ukraine, the embassy said. The U.S. Embassy in Moscow did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Hundreds of people gathered in several European cities and the United States in solidarity with Ukraine as the small nation braced for a potential invasion by its Russian neighbor.

On Sunday, hundreds of protesters waved Ukrainian, Polish and E.U. flags in Warsaw, with some holding signs that read “We Are With Ukraine” and “Hands Off Ukraine,” according to Agence France-Press and local media outlets.

In Madrid, the AFP reported that about 500 people demonstrated against Russian military aggression in Plaza de España, where participants also waved blue and yellow Ukrainian flags or wore them on their backs.

A rare Sunday meeting of the National Security Council on the situation in Ukraine has ended, according to the White House. It lasted for a little over two hours, an NSC official said.

Vice President Harris called in from Air Force Two on her way back to Washington from Munich, where she attended the Munich Security Conference along with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and other leaders over the weekend.

The White House posted a photo of the meeting, attended by officials including national security adviser Jake Sullivan, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, CIA Director William J. Burns, Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark A. Milley. A placard for Avril Haines, director of national intelligence, was also pictured.

The president of the European Council on Sunday restated Brussels’s commitment to imposing new sanctions on Moscow if Russia moves ahead with an invasion, while also taking action to buoy financial assistance to Ukraine.

Speaking at the Munich Security Conference, Charles Michel said the European Council plans to raise 1.2 billion euros ($1.4 billion) for Ukraine and proposed to launch an international donors conference to protect the nation’s economic stability.

“One thing is certain: If there is further military aggression, we will react with massive sanctions,” he said. “The cost for Russia must be, and will be, severe.”

Video shows a group including journalists and Ukrainian Interior Minister Denys Monastyrskiy running from mortar fire in the nation’s Donetsk region, near a separatist-controlled area, on Saturday.

Footage filmed by Maryan Kushnir of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Ukrainian service captures the group — many dressed in camouflage garb and safety vests — running and taking cover on the ground as blasts are heard in Novoluhanske.

“Here! On the ground!” came shouts from the group. “Move it! Fire!”

According to Kushnir, mortars were fired first, then shells fell about 1,000 feet (300 meters) from the location of the minister and journalists.

On CBS’s “Face the Nation” on Sunday, Oksana Markarova, the Ukrainian ambassador to the United States, said that what Ukraine has seen over the past few days stands in stark contrast to what Russian officials have claimed, citing intensifying shelling by Russian forces in eastern Ukraine.

She added that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky — who has accused the United States and its allies of “appeasement” and urged stronger, earlier actions against Russia — is mainly concerned with preserving their country and the lives of all Ukrainians.

Asked Sunday if the United States would recognize Crimea and eastern Ukraine territories as part of Russia to avoid war, Secretary of State Antony Blinken definitively said “no.”

“No, hard stop. That is not up for negotiation?” CBS “Face the Nation” host Margaret Brennan asked him.

“That’s correct,” Blinken responded.

In an interview that also aired Sunday on “Face the Nation,” Anatoly Antonov, the Russian ambassador to the United States, insisted to Brennan that those were not the issues at hand. Russia invaded and annexed the Crimean Peninsula in 2014.

Six months ago, the transatlantic alliance was on shaky ground, with President Biden’s promise of a reinvigorated NATO under U.S. leadership severely undermined by the Afghanistan debacle and a foreign policy that seemed unready for prime time.

Today, Biden and his team have redeemed themselves in the eyes of many NATO allies, with a tough stance on Ukraine and the successful wrangling of the often-fractious alliance to support it.

Ukraine’s fate, and Russia’s future relationship with the West, remain uncertain. Biden has said he is convinced Russian President Vladimir Putin, with more than 150,000 troops and massive weaponry amassed on Ukraine’s borders, has decided to invade, despite the West’s offered carrot of negotiations over a new European security architecture to address his concerns if he withdraws, and the threatened stick of harsh sanctions and isolation if he does not.