Gulf between the United States and Russia getting wider as recalled ambassador reached Moscow after President Joe Biden said he thought Vladimir Putin was a killer, news agency the Tass reported on Sunday.
The Russian Foreign Ministry announced on Wednesday that it was recalling ambassador Anatoly Antonov for urgent talks after Biden’s accusation in a TV interview of President Putin that he was a killer and would have to “pay a price” for alleged meddling in the US election. Moscow denied the allegation.
In response, Putin offered to hold live online talks with the US president, a proposal Biden has not so far accepted.
The Russian embassy in Washington’s social media posted a picture of the ambassador at a US airport.
“Russian Ambassador Anatoly Antonov is on his way to Moscow to participate in consultations on rectifying Russia-US relations,” the embassy said.
A Russian state TV channel quoted the ambassador as saying before departure that there a was a lot of work for the Russian Foreign Ministry and others to do, but that he had no doubt that keeping lines of communication open was in the interests of the American people.
The channel then read out what it said were excerpts of letters sent to ambassador Antonov by Americans before his departure, apologising for Biden’s comments about Putin.
TIES WITH BRITAIN: Meanwhile, Russia’s ambassador to Britain Andrei Kelin has accused London of breaking its international treaty commitments with a plan to increase the country’s nuclear arsenal and said the political relationship between Moscow and London is “nearly dead”.
In a foreign and defence policy review published last week and endorsed by Prime Minister Boris Johnson, Britain said it needed to increase its nuclear arsenal in the face of evolving global security threats.
Britain said it would raise the upper limit on its nuclear warhead stock to 260 from 180. The report also classified Russia as “the most acute threat to our security” in the Euro-Atlantic region.
The Kremlin said that it regretted the British nuclear decision, which it suggested would harm international stability, while the Russian Foreign Ministry described the move as a serious blow to international arms control.
