US sanctions drive Russian-US relations further into deadlock - embassy

New US personal sanctions against Russian officials, announced on March 15, continue to drive bilateral relations further into a dead end, the Russian Embassy in Washington said in a statement published in its Telegram channel on Wednesday.

"Another hostile action drives Russian-U.S. relations further into an even more dead end. It hinders the maintenance of the few channels of interaction between our countries," the statement says.

"Such attacks will not go unanswered, as is required by the principle of reciprocity," it says.

The US Department of State announced sanctions against 11 high-ranking representatives of the Russian military and defense industry officials on March 15, including Russian National Guard head Viktor Zolotov, head of Russian Federal Service on military-technical cooperation Dmitry Shugayev, Rosoboronexport CEO Alexander Mikheyev. The sanctions were imposed, inter alia, against Russian Deputy Ministers of Defense Alexey Krivoruchko, Timur Ivanov, Yunus-Bek Evkurov, Dmitry Bulgakov, Yury Sadovenko, Nikolay Pankov, Ruslan Tsalikov and Gennady Zhidko.