Russia says some forces pulling back amid Ukraine crisis

Russia said on Tuesday that some units participating in military exercises would begin returning to their bases adding to glimmers of hope that the Kremlin may not be planning to invade Ukraine imminently though it gave no details on the pullbackThe announcement came a day after Russias foreign minister indicated the country was ready to keep talking about the security grievances that led to the Ukraine crisis changing the tenor after weeks of rising tensionsStill Western officials continued to warn that an invasion could come at any moment and said some forces and military hardware were moving toward the border muddying the pictureIt wasnt immediately clear where exactly the troops that the Russian Defense Ministry said were pulling back were deployed or how many were leaving making it hard to understand the significance The announcement pushed world markets and the ruble up but Ukraines leaders expressed skepticismRussia constantly makes various statements Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said Thats why we have the rule We wont believe when we hear well believe when we see When we see troops pulling out well believe in deescalationrdquoRussia has amassed more than 130000 troops near Ukraine sparking the fears of an invasion Russia denies it has any plans to invade Ukraine despite placing troops on Ukraines borders to the north south and east and launching massive military drills nearbyThe new glimmers of hope accompanied a flurry of diplomacy German Chancellor Olaf Scholz planned to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow a day after he sat down with Ukraines leader in KyivForeign Minister Zbigniew Rau of Poland one of Russias most strident European critics was also in Moscow on Tuesday to meet Lavrov while Ukraines foreign minister hosted his Italian counterpartForeign Minister Sergey Lavrovs comments came at a madeforTV meeting with Putin and seemed designed to send a message to the world about the Russian leaders position The foreign minister argued that Moscow should hold more talks despite the Wests refusal to consider Russias main demandsldquoThe talks cant go on indefinitely but I would suggest to continue and expand them at this stagerdquo Lavrov said noting that Washington has offered to discuss limits for missile deployments in Europe restrictions on military drills and other confidencebuilding measuresMoscow wants guarantees that NATO will not allow Ukraine and other former Soviet countries to join as members It also wants the alliance to halt weapons deployments to Ukraine and roll back its forces from Eastern EuropeLavrov said possibilities for talks ldquoare far from being exhaustedPutin noted that the West could try to draw Russia into ldquoendless talksrdquo and questioned whether there is still a chance to reach agreement Lavrov replied that his ministry would not allow the US and its allies to stonewall Russias main requestsThe US reacted coolly ldquoThe path for diplomacy remains available if Russia chooses to engage constructivelyrdquo White House principal deputy press secretary Karine JeanPierre said ldquoHowever we are cleareyed about the prospects of that given the steps Russia is taking on the ground in plain sightrdquoOne possible offramp emerged this week Ukraines ambassador to the UK Vadym Prystaiko pointed at a possibility of Ukraine shelving its NATO bid an objective that is written into its constitution if it would avert war with RussiaPrystaiko later appeared to back away from the idea but the fact that it was raised at all suggests it is being discussed behind closed doorsEven amid the hopeful signs the US and European countries kept up their warningsBritish Foreign Secretary Liz Truss reiterated Tuesday that the danger of an invasion still exists telling Sky News that it ldquocould be imminentrdquo But she added that ldquothere is still time for Vladimir Putin to step away from the brinkrdquo Norwegian Foreign Minister Anniken Huitfeldt issued a similar warningUS officials have said the Russian military continued apparent attack preparations along Ukraines borders A US defence official said small numbers of Russian ground units have been moving out of larger assembly areas for several days taking up positions closer to the Ukrainian border at what would be departure points if Putin launched an invasionThe official spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss information not publicly released CBS News was first to report on the movement of the unitsMaxar Technologies a commercial satellite imagery company that has been monitoring the Russian buildup reported increased Russian military activity in Belarus Crimea and western Russia including the arrival of helicopters groundattack aircraft and fighterbomber jets at forward locations The photos taken over a 48hour period also show ground forces leaving their garrisons and combat units moving into convoy formationStill Ukrainian security and defense council chief Oleksiy Danilov downplayed the threat of invasion but warned of the risk of ldquointernal destabilizationrdquo by unspecified forcesldquoToday we do not see that a largescale offensive by the Russian Federation can take place either on Feb 16th or the 17thrdquo he told reporters ldquoWe are aware of the risks that exist in the territory of our country But the situation is absolutely under controlrdquoThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever