Former President Donald Trump on Monday praised his relationship with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin.
The statements came after Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was transferred to a prison hospital and the Pentagon warned about Russia’s troop build-up along the border with Ukraine.
Fox News personality Sean Hannity asked Trump what he would do differently if he were to run again in 2024 and win. Continue reading.
The Biden administration on Tuesday announced new sanctions on Russia in response to Moscow’s poisoning and jailing of Alexei Navalny, accusing Russia’s main intelligence agency of attempting to assassinate the opposition leader last year.
The administration is imposing sanctions on seven members of the Russian government and export controls on several business entities involved in biological agent production. The sanctions include Russian officials and a Russian research center that were previously sanctioned by the European Union and United Kingdom in October in connection with Navalny’s poisoning.
The sanctions, which are being coordinated with EU partners, come after an intelligence community assessment concluded with “high confidence” that officers of Russia’s Federal Security Service used the Novichok nerve agent to poison Navalny in August, Biden administration officials said. Continue reading.
President Biden spoke with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday, the first call between the two leaders since Biden was elected president, and pressed the Russian leader on the SolarWinds hack and the poisoning of opposition leader Alexei Navalny.
White House press secretary Jen Psaki told reporters that the call took place Tuesday afternoon and Biden intended to communicate his administration’s desire to seek a full five-year extension of the New START nuclear arms treaty with Russia. Biden also planned to raise concerns about ongoing Russian aggression, she said.
The White House later issued a formal readout of the call stating Biden and Putin agreed “to have their teams work urgently” to complete the five-year extension of New START by the Feb. 5 deadline. Continue reading.
