The phrase "a sharp escalation of" is correct and usable in written English.
It can be used to describe a sudden and significant increase in something, such as tension, conflict, or prices.
Example: "The report highlighted a sharp escalation of violence in the region over the past month."
Alternatives: "a significant increase in" or "a rapid rise in".
Recent months have seen a sharp escalation of high-profile, illegal weapons trials.
In a sharp escalation of violence, Israeli tanks shelled Palestinian police posts in the West Bank today in response to attacks against Israelis.
The violence was a sharp escalation of Ukraine's two-month political crisis, which has brought round-the-clock protest gatherings, but had been largely peaceful.
The report comes after a sharp escalation of violence in Afghanistan, where more American troops died in August than in any month since the beginning of the war.
Ms. Jiang said the beatings represented a sharp escalation of a recent campaign by the Shanghai authorities to silence Mr. Zheng.
Its imposition was seen as a sharp escalation of China's dispute with Japan over islets that Japan calls the Senkakus and China the Diaoyus.
The attack, in a speech Mr. McCain is to give today, marks a sharp escalation in the war of words between two of the leading Republican presidential contenders.
The UK's leading provider of abortions, the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS), said that there had been a sharp escalation in the number of protests outside clinics and numerous incidents of women being left feeling intimidated or having their anonymity threatened.
Visiting in July she found a sharp escalation in the number of mothers on suicide watch and babies confined to small metal containers, where they cannot learn to crawl or walk.
TRIPOLI, Libya — In a sudden, sharp escalation of NATO's air campaign over Libya, warplanes dropped more than 80 bombs on targets in Tripoli in an assault that began Tuesday morning and continued into the predawn hours of Wednesday, obliterating large areas of Colonel Muammar el-Qaddafi's Bab al-Aziziya command compound and what NATO identified as other military targets around the capital.
Taken together, the attacks were part of a sharp escalation in fighting as insurgents have seized a window of opportunity to press their campaign this summer — taking advantage of a wavering NATO commitment, an outgoing American administration, a flailing Afghan government and a Pakistani government in deep disarray that has given the militants freer rein across the border.
