The backstory
- Russia invaded and annexed the east of Ukraine back in 2014. This led to Russia being removed from The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO), an international alliance including countries within the European Union and the United States.
- Right now, the two regions have a bit of a shaky cease-fire in place. Still, Russia also has about 100,000 troops, according to Western intelligence, at the Russian-Ukrainian border. This has many people concerned about another invasion. However, Russia insists it’s for self-defense.
- There are certain negotiations taking place right now between the US and Russia to try and calm things down. But, there are some demands that have NATO members worried. One is the fact that Russia wants a guarantee that Ukraine won’t be admitted into NATO, which is against the NATO open-door policy.
The development
- Western intelligence services and Ukraine have said that a Russian invasion could happen sometime early this year.
- And now, according to officials at the United Kingdom Foreign Office, the country has been told to get ready to move into “crisis mode.” This essentially just gets the country as ready as possible to deal with emergencies, including getting British people back from areas of conflict.
- This has been invoked in the past with COVID-19 pandemic, Afghanistan withdrawal and the explosion in Beiruit, Lebanon.
- It doesn’t necessarily mean that the UK government thinks an invasion is going to happen, but it’s just to get ready in case they need to move quickly.
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