President Vladimir Putin warned Tuesday that Russia is prepared to respond with “military and technical measures” to what it called unfriendly actions by the West, as tensions over the conflict rise in Ukraine.

“In the event that this position is maintained, which is clearly very aggressive on the part of our Western colleagues, we will adopt military and technical measures that are appropriate,” he said during a meeting at the Defense Ministry, at a time when fear of a Russian invasion of Ukraine grows.

“The reinforcement on the Russian borders of the military groups of the United States and NATO, as well as the organization of extensive military exercises, constitute a serious source of concern”, claimed Putin, at times when the West accuses the Kremlin of having deployed tens of thousands of soldiers to the border with Ukraine in preparation for an offensive.

The Russian president once again stressed the need, in his understanding, for the United States and NATO to provide security guarantees to Russia by signing treaties that prohibit the expansion of the Atlantic Alliance.

Putin had already made these kinds of legal demands on his American counterpart, Joe Biden, during his video conference in early December.

Moscow annexed the Ukrainian peninsula of Crimea and his support for pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine in a war that has killed nearly 13,000 since 2014 is suspected. In addition, he easily defeated Georgia in 2008.

The West refuses to close the NATO door to these two countries, but they have de facto frozen their accession processes.

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