On 15 February, a press conference was held on the outcome of the talks with the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Poland, OSCE Chairman Zbigniew Rau. Sergei Lavrov stated that the military exercises conducted by the Russian Federation in his territory were proceeding strictly as planned.
“They (exercises) are started, implemented and completed as planned”, – said the head of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation. Lavrov stressed that “hysteria” and unfolding “information terrorism” would have no impact on the actions of the country’s armed forces.
Even before the press conference, during a conversation with journalists, Igor Konashenkov, an official representative of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation, said that the military units of the Southern and Western Districts had completed their tasks and started loading on the transporters, who will soon go to military garrisons. In support of this statement, the Russian military department published footage of the loading of equipment on the platform.
Against the backdrop of Russian manoeuvres, Western countries and the Ukrainian government are advancing the idea of a potential Russian invasion of Ukraine. Information about specific dates of a possible attack appeared in Bloomberg’s records. According to Politico, Joe Biden had information about an invasion of Ukraine scheduled for February 16. The sources cited by the authors of such statements are not mentioned. If there is disagreement in the “dates of the attack”, the Western representatives are unanimous on the overall likelihood of this event. For example, British Foreign Minister Liz Truss considers the Russian attack, like many others, to be “highly probable”.
