When US President Donald Trump and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin met for the G-20 Summit in Hamburg, Germany for the first time, it seemed that the two great nations were ready to forget the past conflicts that they ever had and move towards a better and brighter future together. Trump spoke about how both nations should drop their dislike toward each other – which has been ongoing since the Cold War - and meet face-to-face to start a new era.
Why is Putin taking such strict action?
However, Congress decided to approve various sanctions against the country.
Most people assume that this was because of the allegations of collusion and that Russia leaked Hillary Clinton’s emails during the Presidential Elections of 2016.
Russian President Vladimir Putin is ready to take a stand for his country and has asked the U.S. to reduce the number of delegates and technical workers at the US embassy in Russia. He wants the U.S. embassy to decrease the staff from 1000 drastically.
Putin appeared on the state-run Rossiya 1 television and said that the U.S. should cut down the number of employees to 245. He also mentioned that the downsizing should be done before September 1. Nevertheless, Business Insider cited Reuters as mentioning that "The United States can include its local employees among the 755 diplomatic staff it must cut in Russia, a Kremlin spokesman said on Monday, tempering the impact of an ultimatum issued by Russian President Vladimir Putin."
The two sanctions passed by the US
This news comes right after U.S.
passed two sanctions against Russia. Putin also said that Russia is tired of waiting for their relationship with the U.S. to improve. He said that it will get better someday, but it wouldn’t happen anytime soon.
The decision of downsizing has caused major discomfort in Washington, as well as concerned U.S. officials who are currently present in Moscow.
This is one of the harshest moves made by the country after a similar policy was implemented by it against Americans in 1986. Putin commented that Anti-Russian sentiments were being promoted in the U.S. in order to run internal political strategies and that Russia was not involved in the US Presidential Election.
In December 2016, Washington also asked Russia to call back 35 of their delegates from the embassy in the U.S.
Russia seems to be mirroring every political move that the U.S. has made towards it. Russia has taken over two diplomatic compounds of the U.S., which includes a warehouse and an enclave that was used for recreational purposes. The news came just months after the U.S. decided to take back two country estates in December as they suspected they was being used for espionage.
