The western military alliance is doubling the volume of troops on its eastern front in response to Russia’s relentless attack on Ukraine. The secretary-general of NATO, Jens Stoltenberg, says 4 new battlegroups will be deployed to Slovakia, Hungary, Bulgaria and Romania – a big long-term increase in NATO’s presence in the region. It comes as US President Joe Biden gets set to meet his European counterparts in Brussels today, with reports saying that leaders will unveil a package of new measures to punish Russia, including a new round of sanctions on Russian oligarchs, and steps to limit the uptake of Russian oil and gas. On Friday, Biden will travel to Poland and meet President Andrzej Duda to discuss the response to the humanitarian crisis stemming from the war, with the country already welcoming one million refugees over the border. Poland had proposed creating a peacekeeping force in Ukraine, but overnight Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, bristled against this in a televised speech, saying Moscow has the “spirit and will to defend Russian culture in Ukraine.”