Outgoing NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen made a trip to Kyiv on Aug. 8 to “call on Russia to step back from the brink. Step back from the border. Do not use peacekeeping as an excuse for war-making.”

The

statement was followed by a news conference at the Ukrainian Crisis Media

Center in which he said that Russia would face “deeper, more profound, tougher

sanctions” from the West if it continues to intervene through military proxies in

Ukraine’s eastern regions. Without detailing what’s ahead, Rasmussen said the new

sanctions contemplated would “hurt the Russian economy.”