Moscow does not care what US Secretary of State Antony Blinken or any other biased observer thinks about its latest presidential election, Russian Ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov has said.
Last week’s ballot ended with Vladimir Putin winning in a landslide. Blinken blasted the result as “pre-determined,” claiming in a statement on Tuesday that the Kremlin had “denied [Russian] citizens a transparent, meaningful democratic process.” In particular, he claimed that pro-peace candidates had been barred from running “on spurious technical pretenses.”
Russia “shall not accept lecturing and insults” from other states regarding its domestic policies, Antonov said. “We absolutely do not care about biased assessments coming from unfriendly nations,” he added.
We do not issue instructions to people on how they should organize electoral processes and strengthen democracy. We demand the same treatment.
The US and its allies have branded the election as neither free nor fair, while some went as far as refusing to recognize the process as an election. The German government has pledged not to address Putin by his title in official documents.
Putin said the reaction was expected, considering that it was coming from nations that seek to contain Russia and are donating arms to Ukraine. Western countries hardly have flawless political systems, he emphasized, citing the legal pressure put on Donald Trump in the current US election cycle as an example.
”I have every reason to believe that no democracy, at least when it comes to electoral campaigning, can be seen in some Western nations, including the US,” Putin said.