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MOSCOW: Russia’s ambassador to the United States on Friday compared the state of US-Russia relations to an “ice age”, and said that the risk of a clash between the two countries was “high”, Russian State media reported.
TASS cited Anatoly Antonov as saying that it was hard to say when talks on strategic dialogue between the two sides could resume, but that talks on prisoner swaps had been “effective” and would continue.
US-Russia ties have fallen to their lowest point in decades amid the fallout from Russia’s military campaign in Ukraine, and the consequent imposition of Western sanctions.
Two prisoner swaps, in which U.S. Marine veteran Trevor Reed and basketball star Brittney Griner were freed by Russia in return for convicted drug smuggler Konstantin Yaroshenko and arms dealer Viktor Bout, were rare instances of successful U.S.-Russia diplomacy in 2022.
Meanwhile, Russia has strongly criticised the visit to Washington by Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky, accusing the US of fighting an indirect war against it. President Joe Biden has pledged $1.85bn (£1.45bn) of military aid for Ukraine – including an advanced missile system to help guard against Russian attacks.
In a defiant address to US lawmakers, Mr Zelensky welcomed the assistance. But Russia’s US ambassador said these “provocative actions” would lead to an escalation with severe consequences.
Anatoly Antonov told Russian state media that Moscow was “trying to appeal to common sense at all levels”, but talk of delivering the Patriot missile system to Kyiv was “deeply disturbing”.
Patriot missiles are capable, effective and expensive. The White House says they will help defend Ukrainians against “Russia’s barbaric attacks on Ukraine’s critical infrastructure”.
Moscow has complained that no calls for peace were heard during President Zelensky’s trip to Washington – with spokesman Dmitry Peskov describing this as proof that the US was fighting a proxy war with Russia. Mr Peskov added that delivering Patriot missiles would not prevent Russia from “achieving its goals during the special military operation”.
“The talks in Washington have shown that neither Ukraine nor the United States is seeking peace. They are simply intent on continuing the fighting,” said Russian foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova. Russian commentators have echoed this – repeatedly accusing the US of “pumping Ukraine full of weapons”.
Besides, the Kremlin said on Friday that Russia had made significant progress towards “demilitarising” Ukraine, one of the goals President Vladimir Putin declared when he launched his war against Kyiv 10 months ago.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov offered the assessment of Russia’s military progress when asked during a briefing about comments by Putin, who on Thursday said that Ukraine’s defence potential was close to zero.
“It can be stated that there is significant progress towards demilitarisation,” Peskov replied. Ukraine’s own defence potential – its military industrial complex – has been badly disrupted by Russian missile strikes.
But the West has poured tens of billions of dollars’ worth of weapons into Ukraine and U.S. President Joe Biden this week promised a U.S. Patriot air defence system and pledged continued support.
Putin dismissed the Patriot system as “quite old” and said Russia would adapt to it. After suffering a series of defeats in what Moscow calls its “special military operation”, Russia is looking for a battlefield victory in eastern Ukraine where its forces have been trying to capture the small city of Bakhmut for months.
Biden, who has said he’d be ready to talk to Putin if the Russian leader was serious about finding a way to end the war, has spoken of the difficulty that Moscow may face finding what he described as a face-saving off-ramp to end the conflict.
