Joe Biden agrees to summit with Vladimir Putin if Russian invasion of Ukraine does not proceed

Joe Biden has offered to meet Vladimir Putin if the feared Russian invasion of Ukraine does not take place.

The summit would take place after a scheduled meeting between US secretary of state Antony Blinken and his Russian opposite number, Sergey Lavrov, which is also conditional on Moscow not pressing ahead with military action.

Jen Psaki, the White House press secretary, announced the move in a statement on Sunday night amid mounting fears in the US that an invasion is imminent.

It followed a day of shuttle diplomacy by French president Emanuel Macron, who spoke to both Mr Biden and Mr Putin.

“As the President has repeatedly made clear, we are committed to pursuing diplomacy until the moment an invasion begins,” Ms Psaki said.

“Secretary Blinken and Foreign Minister Lavrov are scheduled to meet later this week in Europe, provided Russia does not proceed with military action.

“President Biden accepted in principle a meeting with President Putin following that engagement, again, if an invasion hasn’t happened. We are always ready for diplomacy.”

She added: “We are also ready to impose swift and severe consequences should Russia instead choose war.  And currently, Russia appears to be continuing preparations for a full-scale assault on Ukraine very soon.”

The White House offer came hours after France said it had agreed to hold urgent talks with Russia on a ceasefire in eastern Ukraine on Sunday night in a last-ditch effort to avoid an invasion.

It came as the United States said it would keep working on a diplomatic solution "until the tanks are rolling and planes are in the air".

New footage taken by satellite company Maxar Technologies indicated increased Russian military activity on the Ukraine border.

The company said the photos appeared to show the arrival of attack helicopters and the building of a pontoon bridge in Belarus.

On Sunday, the Elysee Palace said Emmanuel Macron and Vladimir Putin had agreed to discuss a ceasefire and that their foreign ministers would hold talks "in the coming days".  

"This diplomatic work will be undertaken... to achieve, if the conditions are met, a meeting at the highest level to define a new order of peace and security in Europe," it said.

At least 150,000 Russian troops are amassed at Ukraine's borders in what the West now strongly believes is an imminent invasion, despite repeated denials from Moscow.

Mr Macron was also due to speak to Joe Biden, the US president, Olaf Scholz, the German chancellor, and Boris Johnson on Sunday night, French media reports said.

Mr Putin is said to have assured Mr Macron in their phone call that Russia would soon withdraw its forces from Belarus, where Moscow says they are holding exercises. But this contradicted an announcement earlier on Sunday by the Belarusian defence ministry, which said the Russia-led exercises there had been extended.

The Kremlin appeared to pour cold water on the Elysee statement, with no mention of a summit or new European security order in its own account of the call. Instead, it blamed Ukraine for the escalation in the east of the country and accused the West of not taking its security concerns about Nato seriously.

"Considering the above factors, Vladimir Putin once again emphasised the need for the US and Nato to take Russia's demands to ensure its security guarantees as seriously as possible and to respond specifically and to the point," it said.

Moscow added that any further developments reported to have been agreed on in the call with Mr Macron were merely Western "interpretations".

Mr Johnson, meanwhile, said the evidence he had seen pointed to Russia planning "the biggest war since 1945" and suggested sanctions may not be enough to deter Mr Putin if he has become an "irrational actor".

"All the signs are that the plan has already in some senses begun," he told the BBC, as saying an invasion would be likely to strengthen Nato rather than weaken it.

"[Sanctions] may not be enough to deter an irrational actor and we have to accept at the moment that Vladimir Putin is possibly thinking illogically about this and doesn't see the disaster ahead," he added.

It came as the United States warned that Russia was on the "brink" of invading Ukraine and its tanks could soon arrive in Kyiv.

"I mean that's highly likely, you could see that," said Lloyd Austin, the secretary of defence. "You could see a significant amount of combat power move very quickly to take Kyiv."

On Sunday night the US broadcaster CBS reported that Mr Putin had already given a "go order" to military commanders for the invasion of Ukraine to commence. The report could not immediately be verified.

CBS reported that US intelligence believed Russian commanders had been given orders to press ahead with the invasion – although officials added it was still open to Mr Putin to cancel the instructions.

In the US, President Biden convened a meeting of the National Security Council that lasted two hours with vice president Kamala Harris participating from Air Force Two as she flew back from the Munich Security Conference to Washington.

Ms Harris said the world was looking at "the real possibility of war in Europe". She said sanctions should be used as a deterrent, amid demands from Ukraine for the US to take action ahead of any invasion.

Antony Blinken, the US secretary of state, defended Washington's decision not to impose pre-emptive sanctions.

"The purpose of the sanctions in the first instance is to try to deter Russia from going to war. As soon as you trigger them, that deterrent is gone," he said on CNN's State of the Union. "And until the last minute, as long as we can try to bring a deterrent effect to this, we're going to try to do that."

Volodymr Zelensky, the Ukrainian president, called for an immediate ceasefire and the resumption of talks under the Trilateral Contact Group of Russia, Ukraine and the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe.

"We stand for intensifying the peace process," he said, adding that he had informed Mr Macron about "new provocative shelling" on the frontline between Ukrainian forces and Russian-backed rebels.

Mr Macron has decided to postpone the announcement of his candidacy for elections in France until Feb 28 because of the crisis, France Info reported.

Mr Biden cancelled his planned trip to Delaware to remain in Washington DC on Monday, the White House said.

According to CNN, around 75 per cent of Russia's "conventional" forces have now been moved to the borders with Ukraine. This includes 120 battalion tactical groups which are within 37 miles of Ukraine, along with 500 fighter jets and 35 air defence battalions.