Russia distanced itself from civil unrest in the United States following the death of George Floyd, calling it a “domestic issue,” but is still “concerned” about human rights abuses worldwide.
Top Russian official and spokesman for President Vladimir Putin, Dmitry Peskov, told CNBC on Tuesday that while the Kremlin considers the protests surrounding Floyd’s death a “domestic affair of the United States,” the county is “concerned about respect for human rights in every corner of the world and that’s applicable for the United States as well.”
A May statement from the Russian foreign ministry stated that the U.S. “has certainly accumulated systemic human rights problems: race, ethnic and religious discrimination, police brutality, bias of justice, crowded prisons and uncontrolled use of firearms and self-defense weapons by individuals, to name a few.”
Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova added that “it’s time for the U.S. to drop the mentor’s tone and look in the mirror.”
“By taking measures to prevent looting and other illegal actions, authorities should not violate the rights of Americans to peaceful protest,” she said on Thursday. The spokeswoman also expressed frustration over actions taken against journalists. She furthered that the U.S. “simply cannot have any questions for others in the coming years.”
As demonstrations turned violent late last month, some, including former national security adviser to President Barack Obama, Susan Rice, argued that it’s possible foreign actors were trying to “hijack those protests and make them into something very different.” She said Russia could be behind some of the unrest, saying, “This is right out of the Russia playbook.” Peskov, however, denied any involvement in fueling the unrest.
“When we first saw the outbreaks of those riots in the U.S. the first thing we heard is one of the voices saying ‘well, probably, Russia is staying behind those riots.’ It’s very hard for us to understand these comments and the reason for them,” Peskov said.
Last week, Anatoly Antonov, Moscow’s envoy to Washington, also fervently denied the allegations, telling Rossiya-1, “Everything that is happening in the United States is a result of the policy that has been conducted in the U.S. in the field of inter-ethnic and inter-racial relations.”
The conflict over George Floyd’s death has allowed the Russian government to divert attention from its own dismal record on human rights.
