Russian President Vladimir Putin, right, gives a soccer ball to U.S. President Donald Trump during a press conference. File
| Photo Credit: AP

Kremlin praised U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s criticism of Ukrainian strikes with U.S. missiles deep into Russian territory. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

The Kremlin on Friday (December 13, 2024) praised U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s criticism of Ukrainian strikes with U.S. missiles deep into Russian territory and said the position was fully in line with Moscow’s own position.

Also Read | Trump calls for ’immediate’ ceasefire in Ukraine

Mr. Trump criticized Ukraine’s use of U.S.-supplied missiles for attacks deep into Russian territory in a Time magazine interview published on Thursday (December 12), comments that suggest he could alter U.S. policy toward Ukraine.

“The statement itself completely coincides with our position,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters. He said Trump’s statement was in line with “our vision of the causes of escalation”.

Also Read | Ukraine facing ‘massive’ Russian attack on energy sector

“It appeals to us.” (Reporting by Dmitry Antonov Writing by Maxim Rodionov; editing by Guy Faulconbridge)

Russia-US ties are at an all time low, and probably worse than the time since the 1962 Cuban missile crisis when both the countries were closest to an intentional nuclear war, because of the ongoing war between Ukraine and Russia.

Russia has warned its citizens to not visit the US since relations with Washington are confrontational, claiming that they could risk being “hunted” by American authorities.

Maria Zakharova, the spokeswoman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs issued the warning through a news briefing on Wednesday.

“Trips to the United States of America privately or out of official necessity are fraught with serious risks,” she said, and described US-Russia relations as “on the verge of rupture”.

She further issued warnings to avoid travelling to Canada and to the US allies in the European Union saying, “We urge you to continue to refrain from trips to the United States of America and its allied satellite states, including, first of all, Canada and, with a few exceptions, European Union countries, during these holidays.”

In a similar way, the US has also issued a notice to its citizens on avoiding travel in Russia, saying “they may face harassment or detention by Russian security officials”.

The US has backed Ukraine with $62 billion in military aid since the war began in February 2022 and further escalating the issue, last month the US authorised Ukraine to use long-range missiles deep into Russia. This became a watershed moment in the war and the move triggered Moscow to lower its nuclear threshold.

In addition, the US has now handed Ukraine a $20 billion loan, which President Biden said “will be paid back by the interest earned from immobilized Russian sovereign assets”.

“These loans will support the people of Ukraine as they defend and rebuild their country. And our efforts make it clear: tyrants will be responsible for the damages they cause,” he added.

In any case, the White House states that it is only protecting its own interest by supplying weapons to Ukraine meanwhile Russia says the US is merely using Ukraine to weaken and ultimately destroy Russia.
 

File picture of Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, in an interview broadcast on Thursday (December 6, 2024), said the use of a hypersonic missile in the Ukraine war sought to make the West understand that Moscow was ready to use any means to ensure no “strategic defeat” would be inflicted on Moscow.

Russia deployed the Oreshnik hypersonic missile against the Ukrainian city of Dnipro last month in what Kremlin leader Vladimir Putin described as a test of a missile he said could not be brought down. He said Russia could bring other such missiles into action in “combat conditions” if required.

“The message is that you, I mean the U.S. and the allies of the U.S., who also provide these long-range weapons to the Kyiv regime — they must understand that we would be ready to use any means not to allow them to succeed in what they call a strategic defeat of Russia,” Mr. Lavrov told U.S. journalist Tucker Carlson.

“They fight for keeping their hegemony over the world, on any country, any region, any continent. We fight for our legitimate security interests.”

Speaking in English, Mr. Lavrov said the West had refused to discuss upholding security guarantees for Russia in the weeks and months before the February 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine, called a “special military operation” in Moscow.

As Russian troops massed on the Ukrainian border in early 2022, Western leaders urged Moscow not to invade its smaller neighbour. French President Emmanuel Macron met Mr. Putin three weeks before the invasion, saying he had received assurances that Russia would take no action to worsen the situation.

In his comments, Mr. Lavrov said Ukraine had lost the opportunity to maintain its territorial integrity by twice rejecting proposals for a deal, once before the full-scale war began and then in talks in April 2022 in Turkey.

“We did not start this war. We had been for years and years and years sending warnings that pushing NATO closer and closer to our borders is going to create a problem,” he said.

Mr. Putin sent his troops over the border from Russia and its ally Belarus, with Mr. Putin saying Moscow was defending Russian-speakers in eastern Ukraine and seeking to “de-Nazify” the Ukrainian leadership in Kyiv.

Red lines

In the course of the 80-minute interview, Mr. Lavrov also said that the West should abandon any notion that Russia had no “red lines” that it would bar anyone from crossing in defending its interests.

“If they are following the logic which some Westerners have been pronouncing lately, that they don’t believe that Russia has red lines, they announced their red lines, these red lines are being moved again and again, this is a very serious mistake,” he said.

Mr. Lavrov dismissed as “pointless” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy’s peace plan first presented in late 2022 and the subsequent “victory” plan announced earlier this year.

Mr. Putin last June said that Russia was willing to hold talks with Ukraine on condition that Ukraine acknowledged Moscow’s control over the four regions of the country it has annexed, though without fully controlling any of them.

Mr. Zelenskiy’s plan initially called for a complete Russian withdrawal and recognition of its 1991 post-Soviet border. Last month, he said Ukraine could hold talks and leave Russia in place in the territory it holds provided government-controlled areas of Ukraine could be brought under the NATO “umbrella”.

Russian Security Council Secretary Sergei Shoigu. File.
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Senior Russian official Sergei Shoigu on Tuesday (November 12, 2024) told China’s foreign minister Wang Yi their two countries’ most urgent task should be countering “containment” by the United States, as they met for security talks in Beijing.

Moscow and Beijing have expanded military and defence ties since Russia ordered troops into Ukraine nearly three years ago, with Chinese President Xi Jinping one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s most important allies on the world stage.

But Beijing has also found itself increasingly stuck between a burgeoning alliance of Russia and North Korea, which has sent soldiers to Ukraine and this week ratified a landmark defence pact with Moscow.

Speaking to Mr. Wang in Beijing, Mr. Shoigu, the secretary of Russia’s Security Council, stressed the need for China and Russia to “counter the ‘dual containment’ policy directed against Russia and China by the United States and its satellites”.

“The comprehensive partnership and strategic cooperation (between China and Russia) represent a model of collaboration between two powers in today’s world,” Mr. Shoigu told China’s top diplomat.

“Although it is not a military-political alliance like those formed during the Cold War, the relations between our countries surpass this form of interstate relations,” he said, quoted in Russian news agencies.

Mr. Wang affirmed the strength of Beijing’s relationship with Moscow, saying China-Russia ties have “withstood the test of (changing) international circumstances and have always maintained a momentum of healthy and stable development”.

“The more complex the international situation and the more external challenges there are, the more important it is for both sides to solidify unity and cooperate to defend common interests,” Mr. Wang told Mr. Shoigu, according to China’s foreign ministry.

– Russia at Airshow China –

Shoigu was Russia’s defence minister for the first two years of its offensive on Ukraine, before being moved to the Security Council by Putin after a string of military setbacks and criticism from the country’s influential military correspondents.

Mr. Shoigu is also expected to attend this week’s Airshow China, which showcases Beijing’s civil and military aerospace sector every two years in the southern city of Zhuhai.

Russia’s most advanced jet, the Su-57 stealth fighter, made a display flight at the show.

China presents itself as a neutral party in the Ukraine war and says it is not sending lethal assistance to either side, unlike the United States and other Western nations.

But it remains a close political and economic ally of Russia and NATO members have branded Beijing a “decisive enabler” of the war, which it has never condemned.

Last month, the two countries’ defence ministers pledged to deepen bilateral military cooperation.

Russia’s President Vladimir Putin shakes hands with U.S. President Donald Trump. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

The Kremlin said Sunday (November 10, 2024) that it saw “positive signals” from U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s position on Ukraine, while warning it was hard to predict how he would behave in office.

Also Read: ‘Worry’ in Ukraine at Trump victory at critical moment in war

“The signals are positive. Trump during his election talked about how he perceives everything through deals, that he can make a deal that can lead to peace,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said in an interview with State media published Sunday, November 10, 2024.

But Mr. Peskov said it was hard to predict “to what extent he’s going to stick to statements that he made on the campaign trail”.

File picture of U.S. President Donald Trump with Russian President Vladimir Putin
| Photo Credit: AP

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday (November 7, 2024) congratulated Donald Trump on his election victory in his first public comment on the U.S. vote, and he praised the president-elect’s courage during the July assassination attempt.

“His behavior at the moment of an attempt on his life left an impression on me. He turned out to be a brave man,” Mr. Putin said at an international forum following a speech in the Black Sea resort of Sochi.

“He manifested himself in the very correct way, bravely as a man,” he added.

Mr. Putin also said that what Mr. Trump has said “about the desire to restore relations with Russia, to help end the Ukrainian crisis, in my opinion, deserves attention at least.”

The Kremlin earlier welcomed Mr. Trump’s claim that he could negotiate an end to the conflict in Ukraine “in 24 hours” but emphasised that it will wait for concrete policy steps.

″I would like to take this opportunity to congratulate him on his election as president of the United States of America,” Mr. Putin said in a question-and-answer session at the conference.

As to what he expects from a second Mr. Trump administration, Mr. Putin said, “I don’t know what will happen now. I have no idea.”

“For him, this is still his last presidential term. What he will do is his matter,” added Mr. Putin, who this year began a fifth term that will keep him in power until 2030 and could seek six more years in office after that.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Thursday the Kremlin is not ruling out the possibility of contact between Mr. Putin and Trump before the inauguration, given that Mr. Trump “said he would call Putin before the inauguration.”

Mr. Peskov has emphasized that Moscow views the U.S. as an “unfriendly” country that is directly involved in the Ukrainian conflict. He dismissed arguments that Mr. Putin’s failure to reach out quickly to Mr. Trump could hurt future ties, saying that Moscow’s relations with Washington already are at the “lowest point in history” and arguing that it will be up to the new U.S. leadership to change the situation.

The Kremlin’s cautious stand reflected its view of the U.S. vote as a choice between two unappealing possibilities. While Mr. Trump is known for his admiration of Mr. Putin, the Russian leader has repeatedly noted that during Mr. Trump’s first term, there were “so many restrictions and sanctions against Russia like no other president has ever introduced before him.”

Russian Foreign Ministry’s spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said Russia “will continue to make an unwavering contribution to keeping outer space free of weapons of any kind and preventing it from becoming another sphere of tension and armed confrontation”. File
| Photo Credit: Reuters

Russia on May 21 said the United States was seeking to place weapons in space, the latest accusation in an ongoing row that comes a day after Washington vetoed a Russian non-proliferation motion at the United Nations.

“They have once again demonstrated that their true priorities in the area of outer space are aimed not at keeping space free from weapons of any kind, but at placing weapons in space and turning it into an arena for military confrontation,” Russia’s Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in a statement.

The two superpowers have traded multiple accusations of seeking to weaponise space in recent months.

In February, Washington said it was concerned by an “anti-satellite capability that Russia has developed” after U.S. media outlets reported that intelligence agencies had warned their allies that Russia could launch a nuclear weapon into orbit.

Moscow denied those accusations as “malicious” and “unfounded,” saying it does not possess such systems.

Russia has since levelled similar charges at the United States.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov did not provide further details on Tuesday when asked if Moscow had specific information regarding U.S. plans to deploy weapons in space, saying only that the country’s intelligence agencies were monitoring the situation.

“Our special services are performing their work,” he told reporters in a briefing.

The countries have proposed rival non-proliferation motions at the United Nations as part of the spat.

Russia vetoed the U.S. initiative last month, while Moscow’s proposal was blocked by the United States, Britain and France in a vote on Monday.

Moscow said the U.S. initiative focused only on nuclear weapons and that Washington was not seriously interested in a complete ban on weapons in space.

The veto by the United States and its allies “spoke eloquently” about their priorities, Mr. Peskov said Tuesday.

U.S. envoy Robert Wood said Russia’s proposal, which called on all countries to “take urgent measures to prevent for all time the placement of weapons in outer space,” was a distraction and accused Moscow of “diplomatic gaslighting.”

Ms. Zakharova said Tuesday that Russia “will continue to make an unwavering contribution to keeping outer space free of weapons of any kind and preventing it from becoming another sphere of tension and armed confrontation.”

Space is a rare area where the two countries still have a degree of cooperation despite a swathe of Western sanctions and dire relations amid Russia’s offensive on Ukraine.

Both countries ferry each other’s crew members to and from the International Space Station (ISS), where their astronauts are jointly stationed.

Moscow:

Russia said on Sunday US lawmakers’ support for $60.84 billion more in aid for Ukraine showed that Washington was wading much deeper into a hybrid war against Moscow that would end in humiliation on a par with the Vietnam or Afghanistan conflicts.

President Vladimir Putin’s 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine has touched off the worst fall-out in relations between Russia and the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, according to Russian and U.S. diplomats.

On Saturday, the US House of Representatives passed with broad bipartisan support a $95 billion legislative package providing security assistance to Ukraine, Israel and Taiwan, over bitter objections from some far-right Republicans.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said it was clear that the United States wanted Ukraine “to fight to the last Ukrainian” including with attacks on Russian sovereign territory and civilians.

“Washington’s deeper and deeper immersion in the hybrid war against Russia will turn into a loud and humiliating fiasco for United States such as Vietnam and Afghanistan,” Zakharova said.

Russia, she said, will give “an unconditional and resolute response” to the U.S. move to get more involved in the Ukraine war.

U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Director William Burns warned last week that without more U.S. military support Ukraine could lose on the battlefield, but that with support Kyiv’s forces could hold their own this year.

The United States has repeatedly ruled out sending its own or other NATO-member troops to Ukraine, which is fighting a grinding artillery and drone war with Russia along a heavily fortified 1,000-km (600-mile) front.

The United States lost more than 58,000 military personnel in the 1955-75 Vietnam War, which ended with Communist North Vietnam’s victory and takeover of the South, while hundreds of thousands of civilians were killed.

In the 2001-2021 war in Afghanistan, the U.S. reported 2,459 dead and over 20,000 wounded in the conflict which ended with the withdrawal of U.S.-led coalition forces and return to power of the Islamist Taliban movement.

The Soviet Union lost 14,453 personnel in the 1979-1989 war in Afghanistan. Civilian deaths in both the wars in Afghanistan were vast.

UKRAINE WAR

Russia now controls about 18% of Ukraine – in the east and south of its neighbour – and has been incrementally gaining ground since the failure of Kyiv’s 2023 counter-offensive to make any serious inroads against Russian troops dug in behind minefields patrolled by drones and guarded by heavy artillery.

Ukraine has for months been begging the United States to release more money and weapons to help it fight, though Russian officials have asserted that U.S. aid will not change the ultimate course of the war.

Zakharova said that ordinary Ukrainians were being “forcibly driven to slaughter as “cannon fodder” but that the United States was now no longer betting on a Ukrainian victory against Russia. Washington, she said, was hoping Ukraine could hold on until the U.S. presidential election in November.

The U.S. legislative package includes measures that would allow the U.S. to seize billions of dollars’ worth of Russian assets frozen by sanctions imposed on Moscow. That, said Zakharova, was simply “theft”, adding that the true beneficiaries of the whole package were U.S. defence companies.

The leaders of the West and Ukraine have cast the war in Ukraine as an imperial-style land-grab showing that post-Soviet Russia is one of the top two biggest nation-state threats to global stability, alongside China.

Putin presents the war as part of a much broader struggle with the U.S., which he says ignored Moscow’s interests after the Soviet Union’s 1991 break-up and then plotted to cleave Russia apart and grab its natural resources.

The West denies that it wants to destroy Russia, which in turn denies that it intends to invade any NATO member state.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)