WASHINGTON, January 29. /TASS/. The US authorities are going to send some extra troops to Eastern Europe in the near future, US President Joe Biden told reporters on Friday.

"I’ll be moving US troops to Eastern Europe and the NATO countries in the near term — not a lot," Biden said as quoted by the White House press corps.

When asked if there is new information on the situation in Ukraine, Biden replied: "No, not in the last couple hours."

On Monday, Pentagon spokesman John Kirby told reporters that the US is ready to send 8,500 troops to Europe, but a final decision hasn’t been made yet. According to him, these would be combat, reconnaissance, aviation, medical and transport units. On Tuesday, Kirby clarified on CNN that the United States has no plans to deploy troops in Europe outside of NATO allies.

Recently, claims of Russia’s potential invasion of Ukraine have been echoed quite often in Ukraine and throughout Western countries. Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov lambasted such reports as an "empty and groundless escalation of tensions", underscoring that Russia does not pose any threat to anyone. Peskov noted that provocations may happen in order to justify such claims and warned that such attempts will bear the most serious consequences.