Biden joins emergency Nato session on Ukraine invasion

WASHINGTON • United States President Joe Biden joined an emergency Nato summit yesterday to strengthen the frantic Western response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine and fears for the security of Europe.

Mr Biden, who has spent weeks trying to lead a united transatlantic response to Russia's aggression against its neighbour, was meeting "fellow Nato heads of state and government in an extraordinary virtual summit to discuss the security situation in and around Ukraine", the White House said.

The meeting, with Mr Biden joining from the White House Situation Room, was not open to the media.

Caught between wanting to resist Russia's blatant overturning of post-World War II European security norms and unwillingness to risk confrontation between the nuclear armed powers, Nato is walking a fine line in the face of what looks like a resurgence of the Cold War.

Nato also finds itself enmeshed in the conflict because it was Ukraine's long-term ambition of joining the alliance and the European Union - in hopes of fully breaking free from Russian domination - that in part prompted the Kremlin's decision to attack.

Mr Biden has repeatedly said that Ukraine is nowhere near being able to join Nato, and is also firm that US troops will not go there to help push back Russia.

Czech President Milos Zeman told heads of state from Nato's eastern flank countries yesterday that the West should cut Russia off from the Swift system for international bank payments or Ukraine will fall in days.

"We have two options - either we will exclude Russia from Swift, or we will observe a complete occupation of Ukraine by Russia in several days," a text of his remarks released on the presidential website said. "I am in favour of the first option."

Sanctions unveiled so far will hit Russian banks' business in US dollars, euros, pounds and yen. For now, they will not condemn the Russian economy to anything like isolation: The gas on which Europe depends will keep flowing and Russia's banks will retain access to the Swift global bank messaging system.

Britain and nine other northern European defence allies agreed in a call yesterday that further sanctions should be imposed on Russia, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson's office said.

Mr Johnson told the so-called Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF) bloc - which includes Baltic and Scandinavian states - that the crisis "was a defining moment in European history".

"The leaders agreed that more sanctions were needed, including focusing on (Russian) President (Vladimir) Putin's inner circle, building on the measures that had already been agreed," his Downing Street office said, following the call.

The JEF, set up in 2012, is made up of Nato members Denmark, Estonia, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Norway and the United Kingdom, and non-members Finland and Sweden. It is focused on security in the "High North" region around the Arctic, the North Atlantic and the Baltic Sea area.

The European Union's foreign policy chief said that he has urged China to use its influence with Moscow to respect Ukraine's sovereignty, adding that if the United Nations General Assembly fails to condemn Russia's in-vasion of Ukraine, it is "the law of the jungle".

"I have been talking with the Chinese minister this morning, asking him to use their influence... to respect the sovereignty and integrity of everybody, including Ukraine," Mr Josep Borrell told reporters.

Referring to a resolution on Russia's invasion of Ukraine at the UN Security Council, he said that it would be vetoed by Moscow, but he hoped the resolution would then be adopted by the General Assembly.

AGENCE FRANCE-PRESSE, REUTERS