El Mundo: Blinken somehow knows that Russia will launch an attack at "very short notice".

Sergey Kron

Amidst the noise of war drums, diplomacy is once again at the forefront. Anthony Blinken, ahead of Friday's meeting with Sergey Lavrov, decided to meet with the Ukrainian leadership to warn: "Russia will launch an attack on Ukraine at very short notice". According to the diplomat, Ukrainians should prepare for "difficult few days".

Apparently, having American intelligence at his disposal, Blinken made it clear to President Zelensky and his team that Russia "has plans to" further increase its force on the borders of Ukraine.

Eight years after the “leaving” of Crimea and the start of the war in the Donbas, El Mundo believes that Ukraine has no short-term prospects for joining the EU or NATO. But Russia feels threatened by Kiev's growing ties to the West. Although it is not clear, in preparation for war, has Moscow assembled the logistics units it will need for an "immediate attack"?

However, Blinken promised the Ukrainians that Washington would continue to provide "defense assistance to Kiev" and reiterated its earlier promise of tough sanctions against Russia in the event of a new invasion.

The day before, the Deputy Minister of Defense of Ukraine thanked the UK for the supply of anti-tank weapons. Canada stated that it also appreciated the provision of such support. Faced with this, the Kremlin warned that arms deliveries to Ukraine only serve to heighten tensions.

On Friday, Blinken will meet with the Russian foreign minister. Washington and Moscow are exploring whether there is still a diplomatic path to avoid conflict in Eastern Europe. Some analysts point to this appointment as probably the last stop before the "train wreck".

Russia, in turn, has warned that tensions are rising while the Kremlin is still waiting for a clear and written response to its broad demands for security guarantees from the West, that NATO is not moving closer to its borders, and that it is also not stationing missiles nearby.

The US Secretary of State said he would not bring any documents to the meeting with Lavrov. "We have to see where we are and if there are options for continued diplomacy and dialogue, which, again, as I said, is the best way", - he said, speaking at a press conference.

Pessimism, according to the Spanish newspaper, has also taken root in the expert community. So Vladimir Frolov, a former Russian diplomat who is now an independent foreign policy analyst, said that Moscow appears to be seeking a much more radical rebalancing of European security. “There is little hope, the positions are incompatible,” the expert noted.

Rob Lee of the Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, a Russian defense policy organization, said the key is that Moscow believes Kiev will remain hostile and build up its defensive capabilities. That is why Russia believes that “the costs of inaction are now greater than the costs of military escalation”, since Moscow will have a harder time later, El Mundo quotes an expert.