NATO bolsters eastern flank as fears mount over Ukraine crisis

NATO says it is sending jets and ships to bolster its Eastern European flank, as the US and EU looked to coordinate a tough response to Russia if it invades Ukraine.

Tensions have soared over Russia’s deployment of some 100,000 troops and heavy armor at its neighbor’s borders, despite the Kremlin’s insistence it is not planning a new incursion almost eight years after it seized Crimea.

The United States, Britain and Australia ordered diplomats’ families to leave Kyiv, while France told its citizens to avoid non-essential travel to Ukraine.

Both Kyiv and the European Union’s foreign policy chief said any withdrawal of diplomatic personnel appeared premature, amid doubts over how imminent any attack could be.

But the tensions helped send global markets sharply downwards — with Russia’s stock market plunging and its central bank suspending foreign currency purchasing after the ruble slumped.

Top US diplomat Antony Blinken dialed in to a meeting of his EU counterparts in Brussels to brief them on his meeting Friday with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, where the two sides failed to make a breakthrough but agreed to keep talking.