Russia orders thousands of troops to return to base after military drills near Ukraine

Russian President Vladimir Putin has ordered thousands of soldiers to return to the defence base after they conducted month-long drills near Ukraine, prompting fears of invasion of its ex-Soviet neighbour, and reaction from the West. More than 10,000 Russian troops were spotted returning with their weaponry and equipment after holding military exercises on the border with Kyiv as well as further afield in regions surrounding neighbourhood territories of Stavropol, Astrakhan, North Caucasus republics, and in Russia's Caucasus ally Armenia. 

"A stage of combat coordination of divisions, combat crews, squads at motorized units has been completed," Russia’s state-affiliated agency INTERFAX announced on Saturday. 

The Russian Defence Ministry, meanwhile, was quoted in the report as declaring that the military drills for Southern Military District forces that were conducted in a host of southern regions including Rostov, Krasnodar, and Crimea had concluded. Russian President Putin ramped the military presence from 60,000 to 90,000 on the border as tensions soared with Ukraine over the US military’s joint exercise held with the NATO forces in the neighbouring Black Sea, where Russia has forbidden the foreign warships to enter. 

A US intelligence report revealed that Moscow, extremely provoked with the US and its allies, planned to ramp up the Russian soldiers to as high as 175,000 on the Ukrainian border, as it flexed the military muscle in a dire warning to the Western nations. Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova at a presser had lambasted US and NATO’s behaviour as ‘reckless and provocative’ one that threatened the security of Moscow.

Russian leader accuses West of deploying weapons 'at our doorstep'

Moscow expects the United States to abandon plans to dominate the Black Sea, the Kremlin asserted, after US Sixth Fleet (SIXTHFLT), a naval striking group entered the Black Sea with the control ship USS Mount Whitney to hold a joint operation alongside NATO allies and partners. Russian Foreign Ministry warned that the US and NATO moves lead to a “decrease in predictability and seriously increases the risk of escalation.” 

Recently, amid the fears of Ukrainian incursion by Russia, Putin handed a document seeking ‘NATO guarantees’ that would preclude any further Western expansion and deployment of its weapons near Russia’s border. Russia is not threatening anyone, Putin clarified at a state conference, categorically stressing that seeks strong, reliable, and long-term guarantees of its security from the US and allies who have deployed weapons “at our doorstep.”

“While engaging in dialogue with the United States and its allies, we will insist on the elaboration of concrete agreements that would rule out any further eastward expansion of NATO,” the Russian leader noted. West has “failed” to deliver on verbal commitments, he reiterated, as he called for the US President Joe Biden to engage in detailed dialogue on the issue, and also to secure the guarantees. The Russian leader has asked NATO to remove the multinational battalions from Poland and the Baltic states of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania and abort the military alliance with Kyiv or Russia would take "appropriate retaliatory" steps to what he labelled the “aggressive moves” of the West.