US President Joe Biden spoke with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin from his retreat at Camp David, Maryland, February 12, 2022 The White House readout of US President Joe Biden’s conversation with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Saturday conveys the impression that its leitmotif was Washington’s threat of sanctions against Russia if it attacked Ukraine. But …
Continue reading “Biden dials back belligerence toward Russia”
Breakaway Donbass region prepares for attack by Ukrainian extreme nationalist forces emboldened by western support The two takeaways out of the French President Emmanuel Macron’s visit to Moscow and his six-hour long talks with President Vladimir Putin have been the assurance held out by the latter that Russian forces would not ramp up the crisis …
During the visit by President Vladimir Putin to Beijing on Friday, the world attention was focused on how far China would go in support of Russia in the latter’s standoff with the US and NATO. From the joint statement issued after the visit, China has given fulsome support to Russia, endorsing Moscow’s demand for security …
Continue reading “China’s support is a game changer for Russia”
A radar vehicle of the S-400 Triumph surface-to-air missile system on the way to Belarus, Khabarovsk region, Russia, Jan 21, 2022 The US-Russia talks in Geneva in the last two successive weeks could not produce a breakthrough. Fundamentally, there is a contradiction that cannot be resolved easily. Russia sees in existential terms the NATO’s advance …
A US Navy destroyer crosses the Bosphorus to enter the Black Sea, as tensions simmer around Ukraine. (File photo) Being a “swing state” may have tactical advantages but when life gets tough and the tough gets going, there could be consequences. Turkey once faced such a moment of truth a hundred years ago. It faces a similar predicament …
US president Joe Biden speaks on the phone to his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, Delaware, Dec. 30, 2021 Getting off your high horse is never easy and it remains to be seen how deftly Moscow navigates its path in the downstream of President Vladimir Putin’s 50-minute phone conversation Thursday with his American counterpart Joe Biden. …
A fateful week is ending today for international security with the Russian Foreign Ministry releasing the two documents on security guarantees that Moscow had proposed to Washington as the basis for discussions to ease the tensions over NATO’s eastward expansion and to cease the alliance’s deployments close to Russia’s borders, including in Ukraine. Out of …
Russian President Vladimir Putin (R) and Chinese President Xi Jinping after their talks, Kremlin, Moscow, June 5, 2019. The initiative by Beijing to propose a virtual meeting between President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday radically transforms the geopolitics of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation’s relentless eastward expansion and the Western military …
Continue reading “Russia-China alliance at the tipping point”
US President Joe Biden (R) and aides talking with Russian president Vladimir Putin, December 7, 2021 This must be a rare occasion when Russian President Vladimir Putin during his 18 years in the Kremlin came out second best in an encounter with an American president. And it had to be at the hands of President …
US President Biden dismisses Russia’s red lines on Ukraine What has unfolded in the past 24 hours in the US-Russia diplomatic tango can be seen as a foreplay of the meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Joe Biden, which is slated for Tuesday evening. Russia has got what it has been keenly …
