Russian patience on sanctions imposed on it by the
former Obama administration, snapped on Friday, after another round of
sanctions imposed by the US Congress.
In a reaction, the Kremlin ordered the United
States to cut hundreds of diplomatic staff in and said it was seizing
two U.S. diplomatic properties.
Moscow’s decision, which had echoes of the Cold
War, was announced by the Foreign Ministry a day after the U.S. Senate
overwhelmingly approved new sanctions on Russia. The bill now passes to
President Donald Trump for final approval.
Russia had been threatening retaliation for weeks.
Its response suggests it has set aside initial hopes of better ties with
Washington under Trump, something the U.S. leader, before he was
elected, had said he wanted to achieve.
Relations were already languishing at a post-Cold
War low after U.S. intelligence agencies accused Russia of trying to
meddle in last year’s U.S. presidential election to boost Trump’s
chances, something Moscow flatly denies.
The new sanctions were in part a response to the
agencies’ findings that Russia did meddle in the election, and to
further punish Russia for its annexation of Crimea in 2014.
The Russian Foreign Ministry complained of growing
anti-Russian feeling in the United States, accusing “well-known circles”
of seeking “open confrontation”.
President Vladimir Putin had warned on Thursday
that Russia would have to retaliate against what he called boorish U.S.
behavior, and Dmitry Peskov, his spokesman, told reporters on Friday
that the Senate vote was the last straw.
A top White House aide said on Thursday that Trump
might veto the legislation in order to push for a tougher deal. But the
bill is expected to garner enough support in both chambers to override
any veto.
The Russian Foreign Ministry said the United States
had until Sept. 1 to reduce its diplomatic staff in Russia to 455
people, the number of Russian diplomats left in the United States after
Washington expelled 35 Russians in December.
“Extreme Aggression”
It was not immediately clear how many U.S.
diplomats and other workers would be forced to leave either the country
or their posts, but the Interfax news agency cited an informed source as
saying “hundreds” of people would be affected.
A diplomatic source told Reuters that it would be
for the United States to decide which posts to cut, whether occupied by
U.S. or Russian nationals.
An official at the U.S. Embassy, who declined to be
named because they were not allowed to speak to the media, said the
Embassy employed around 1,100 diplomatic and support staff in Russia,
including Russian and U.S. citizens.
The Russian Foreign Ministry’s statement said the
passage of the bill confirmed “the extreme aggression of the United
States in international affairs”.
“Hiding behind its ‘exceptionalism’, the United
States arrogantly ignores the positions and interests of other
countries,” it said.
“Under the absolutely invented pretext of Russian
interference in its domestic affairs, the United States is aggressively
pushing forward, one after another, crude anti-Russian actions. This all
runs counter to the principles of international law.”
Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov met outgoing
U.S. ambassador John Tefft on Friday to inform him of the counter
measures, Russian news agencies reported. The U.S. Embassy said the
ambassador had expressed his “strong disappointment and protest”.
Most U.S. diplomatic staff, including around 300
U.S. citizens, work in the main embassy in Moscow, with others based in
consulates in St Petersburg, Yekaterinburg and Vladivostok.
The Russian Foreign Ministry said it was also
seizing a Moscow dacha compound used by U.S. diplomats for recreation,
from Aug. 1, as well as a U.S. diplomatic warehouse in Moscow.
Face-to-Face Meeting
The former Obama administration seized two Russian
diplomatic compounds – one in New York and another in Maryland – at the
same time as it expelled the Russian diplomats in December.
Putin said at the time that he would wait to see how Trump handled the issue before responding, and Trump praised his restraint.
The two men met for the first time at a G20 summit
in Germany this month in what both sides described as a productive
encounter, but Russian officials have become increasingly convinced that
Congress and Trump’s political opponents will not allow him to mend
ties, even if he wants to.
NAN
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