while attempting to broker some kind of diplomatic solution. alex march quqmarquardt. people called this the most tenuous moment since the end of the cold war. reporter: john, these talks are absolutely critical, aimed at deterring any sort of russian military incursion into ukraine. the talks between u.s. and russia have been taking place four hours time at the mission in geneva. now, there are a number of things on the table. there are a number of things not on the table. the u.s. is coming in with a sense of realism because they have been dealing with russia so long on u.n. security issues. but the russians have said they are disappointed with the signals they have been hearing from d.c. ahead of the talks. and the u.s. said they don t expect to come out with any sort of concrete breakthrough. that is in part because the stuff that russia wants to talk about is not necessarily what the u.s. wants to talk about or
all of this trying to prevent war in ukraine. and if these talks fail, john, the u.s. says they will be forced to turn to economic sanctions, unprecedented, massive sanctions against russia in order to make the possibility of going into ukraine very untenable for them. john. all kinds of concerns about diplomatic traps being set by the russians this week. we re lucky to have you there. please keep us posted. all right. let s get the view from moscow on these talks and bring in cnn s matthew chance. math chew, if you can give us a sense how russia is approaching the talks and what s at stake here. reporter: well, as alex was saying, i mean, it looks like these are the kinds of talks that are doomed from the outset with the extraordinary, you know, unacceptable demands, according to officials that the russians have set out as a basis for the discussions. namely, an end to any expansion of the nato military alliance, a
pull back of weapons from countries in nato that joined the alliance after the fall of the soviet union. you know, western officials have made it quite clear that that is not something they re prepared to exceed to and not even prepared to discuss. but, you know, i think you have to understand there are areas in the demands that russia has made to get these talks going, there could be some cooperation on. alex mentioned the possibility of talks about deploying nuclear capable missiles on the continent of europe. that s something that russia wants an agreement on. it s something the united states is prepared to discuss as well. and things like the extent and the number of exercises that are taking place. close to the borders or on the borders. that s something that will be up for negotiations as well, as well as bilateral issues and diplomats in each other s countries. there are 120 diplomats