Secretary of State Marco Rubio raised concerns with his Russian counterpart that the war in Ukraine could easily spill over into other regions through hybrid attacks or even genuine misunderstandings.
Speaking at a press conference at the U.N. General Assembly on Wednesday, Rubio said that the threat of a broadening conflict is increasingly serious amid hybrid attacks in Europe and elsewhere.
“One of the concerns we have, among many, about the war between Russia and Ukraine is that it could metastasize and spread into other places — that it could grow into somewhere else,” Rubio said. “Be it through a hybrid attack, be it through a sabotage attack, be it through a misunderstanding — some pilot went the wrong way, and suddenly you’ve got active combat.”
He continued: “These things are of concern. We raised that in multiple meetings with multiple countries because it’s a real concern. This is how things sometimes get out of control … war metastasizes to other parts of the world or some other country.”
Hybrid attacks believed to be perpetrated by Russia have been reported across the European continent in recent weeks, clustered on the Eastern flank of NATO but extending to countries such as Germany. In one notable example last month, a drone loaded with an explosive device was discovered at a German airport, sending security officials into a frenzy and grounding planes.
Rubio met with Russian Foreign Affairs Minister Sergey Lavrov on the sidelines of the U.N. assembly earlier in the day. A boilerplate readout from the State Department said only that the delegations “discussed the Russia-Ukraine war and the U.S.-Russia bilateral relationship.”
Rubio declined to give details about his conversation with Lavrov, telling reporters that “these meetings don’t work very well with anybody if I leave the meeting and tell the media ‘this is what we talked about, that’s what we talked about.’”
“I’m not trying to be secretive with you, I’m just telling you — let’s be frank here — these meetings don’t work well,” he said.
President Donald Trump similarly met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky on the sidelines of the assembly on Tuesday to discuss paths to peace and potential military support for the war.
The bilateral conversation came after Trump made an address to the gathered world leaders that the Russian invasion would end “more quickly than people understand.”
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Russian President Vladimir Putin did not attend this year’s U.N. assembly, but Rubio revealed at the press conference that the United States invited the Russian leader to the December G20 meeting in Miami.
“We think it’s an opportunity for [Putin] to engage not just with [Trump] but with other world leaders. We hope that’s an invitation he’ll accept,” Rubio said. “We remain open to engaging.”
Putin’s attendance at the meeting would be the second time he meets face-to-face with Trump since the president returned to office. They previously held a summit in Alaska, where Trump said he intended to invite Putin to the G20.
