Russia is ready to start normalizing relations with the US, but Washington should make the first step, the Russian President Vladimir Putin said at the international forum devoted to the intellectual heritage of Russia’s prominent diplomat and politician Yevgeny Primakov in Moscow.
"The Russian-US relations had degraded considerably over the past few years, but this is not our fault," he said.
"Now, that the election campaign in the United States is over and a new president is about to move into the White House, it is to be hoped that there will emerge a chance to establish relations crucial not only to both countries, but also to ensure international stability and security," TASS cited Putin as saying.
Putin told the forum that in a recent telephone conversation with US President-elect Donald Trump the two leaders agreed that the "unsatisfactory condition of Russian-US relations should be certainly straightened out." "Russia is prepared to meet the partner halfway," Putin said.
"The initiative we put forward of forming a broad front in the fight against terrorism must be implemented. Unfortunately, this front has not been created so far, but there is no alternative to it," the President stressed.
The deputy dean of the Faculty of Global Economics and International Affairs of the Higher School of Economics of the National Research University, Andrei Suzdaltsev, speaking to Vestnik Kavkaza, noted that Washington's future administration is already showing certain steps towards normalization of relations with Russia. "I mean those very tough hints towards its NATO allies, the Baltic states on the need to seriously think about increasing their own military expenditures and the protection at their own expense, not at the expense of the United States. These things, of course, are indirectly related to relations between the West and Russia," he pointed out.
"Also, Trump offers to solve the problem of joint actions against international terrorism and the Syrian problem. This set of the key Russia's problems is evaluated in Trump's speeches quite positive, there is hope that we will reach a new dialogue. The fact is that, unfortunately, there was no dialogue at all with the previous administration," Andrei Suzdaltsev drew attention.
A member of the European Research Centre of the International Relations Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences, Vladimir Olenchenko, who participated in the forum devoted to Yevgeny Primakov, said that many foreigners at this forum expressed the need to stop the confrontation with Russia. "while listening to Putin's remarks I sit next to the British, and they said that, apparently, it is time for the normalization of relations and expressed hope that practical steps in this direction will be really taken from the US side. I do not I know what concrete step will be the first, but maybe it will be easier to make it in the obvious areas, such as the weakening of the sanctions and the joint fight against terrorism," he believes.
