European security crisis at "the most dangerous moment, Johnson says

U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson is visiting NATO Headquarters
in Brussels on Feb. 10, and at a joint press conference with NATO Secretary
General Jens Stoltenberg spoke about the situation along Ukraine’s border.
Johnson says that the “intelligence remains grim” regarding Russia’s military
buildup on Ukraine’s borders, but that “I honestly don’t think that a decision
has yet been taken”. However, Johnson said that “This is probably the most
dangerous moment. I would say that in the course of the next few days, in what
is the biggest security crisis that Europe has faced for decades and we’ve got
to get it right,” theguardian.com reports.

While Johnson is in Brussels, UK foreign secretary Liz
Truss is in Moscow, where she is meeting Russian foreign minister Sergei
Lavrov. Truss told Lavrov on Feb. 10 that, “Russia must respect the sovereignty
and territorial integrity of Ukraine, as Russia freely signed up to do in the
1994 Budapest memorandum,” theguardian.com reports.

Also, a Normandy Four meeting is underway in Berlin,
where representatives from Ukraine, France, Germany and Russia are discussing
ways to come to an agreement on how to interpret the agreement. Ukraine is
represented by the head of the Office of the President, Andriy Yermak.

James Hydzik: This round of the intense diplomatic effort captures the news cycle
that could have been dominated by the Russian and Belorussian military
exercises. As the exercises are the largest held in Europe since the Cold War,
they should have generated headlines. However, whether Johnson is being an
alarmist or not, the British effort today in particular has taken an objective
in the media part of the asymmetric war.