President Trump’s term in office is coming to an end without any breakthrough agreements with Russia, to the “deepest regret” of a top diplomat in Moscow.
“Everything has just stalled at the level of attempts to resolve one issue or the other,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said, per state-run TASS. “Unfortunately, again, because of internal political conflicts in the U.S., all of this has been decelerated.”
Trump’s presidency was haunted by suspicions stemming from Russian interference in the 2016 elections, which spurred multiple investigations that produced no charges of a conspiracy between his campaign and the Russian government but exposed his campaign chairman’s business relationship with “a Russian intelligence officer.” Trump lamented that the domestic political controversy put “great pressure” on his administration, even as his team adopted hawkish policies to constrain Russian aggression.
“I cannot name right now a single issue which would have been resolved in this strategic aspect,” Zakharova said. “There were a lot of issues like that, there were attempts to resolve them, many solutions were offered.”
The last four years have featured a breakdown of arms control agreements between Russia and the United States. Russian violations of a 1987 ban on land-based, intermediate-range cruise missiles resulted in a U.S. withdrawal from the landmark Cold War pact. American and Russian negotiators are in the midst of an eleventh-hour push to avoid the expiration of the New START Treaty.
“Lately, there were talks, consultations, opinion exchanges on strategic stability, and disarmament, but to our deepest regret, they did not lead to breakthrough solutions although there had been many proposals,” she said.
Still, Russian President Vladimir Putin isn’t rushing to reach out to Joe Biden’s team, citing Trump’s plan to file lawsuits questioning the integrity of the election processes in key battleground states.
“Anticipating your possible question about congratulations from Putin to the U.S. president-elect, I want to say the following: We consider it correct to wait for the official results of the elections to be announced,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said. “They are facing certain legal procedures that were announced by the incumbent president, which makes this situation different. So, we deem it as correct to wait for the official announcement.”
