Donald Trump has praised Vladimir Putin for not retaliating against President’s Obama’s sanctions for Moscow’s alleged hack of the presidential election.
Trump’s comments came on the heels of Putin’s decision to overrule the earlier announced move by Russian Foreign Minister that the Kremlin would be retaliating the expulsion of the Russian diplomats.
Instead, Putin responded by declining to initiate tit-for-tat expulsions, and then invited American diplomats’ children to the Kremlin for a New Year’s party.
Putin had been expected to mirror Obama’s decision to expel 35 intelligence agents with Cold War-style revenge expulsions.
His foreign minister Sergey Lavrov had called for the measure, but instead Putin – who coolly met the makers of a Russian TV drama about Vikings and posed with a large sword – said he was waiting to deal with Donald Trump after his January 20 inauguration.
‘We will not create problems for American diplomats. We will not expel anyone,’ Putin said in a statement inviting children of US diplomats to the holiday soiree.
‘We evaluate the new unfriendly steps by the outgoing US administration as a provocation aimed at further undermining Russian-American relations.’
Lavrov had fired back at Barack Obama’s decision, suggesting expelling officials and closing down an area used by Americans for their summer retreat on the outskirts of Moscow and a warehouse south of Moscow.
But Putin dismissed the idea, saying he did not want to stop youngsters from being able to use the area.
The apparent decision to over-rule Lavrov is likely to have been orchestrated from the start to emphasize the options open to Moscow, rather than being done as a slap-down from Putin.
Trump, in a dramatic intervention which puts him directly at odds with Obama, also said the Russian president is ‘very smart.’
Putin had said he would keep his powder dry until Trump was in office, and seemed to go out of his way to praise America’s president-elect in a New Year’s message to world leaders.
Trump said in a tweet that it was a ‘great move,’ adding: ‘I always knew he was very smart!’
The official Twitter account of the Russian Embassy in Washington quickly retweeted the message.