For the first time, US President Joe Biden described Russian leader Vladimir Putin as a “war criminal”.
Until now, the Biden administration has avoided using this definition, even when asked directly.
But Biden asked a journalist directly after an event at the White House, “Would you describe Putin as a war criminal?” When he was asked, he said “No” in the first place, but when asked again he replied “Yes, I think he is a war criminal”.
White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki said Biden “spoke from the heart” rather than making an official statement, referring to the barbaric actions of a brutal dictator during his invasion of a foreign country.
However, there are concerns that Biden’s words will increase diplomatic tensions between the US and Russia.
Speaking to TASS News Agency, Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov described Biden’s words as “an unacceptable and unforgivable rhetoric by the leader of a country that has killed hundreds of thousands of people in many parts of the world.”
Biden, on his official Twitter account, said, “Putin is causing terrible destruction in Ukraine, bombing residences and maternity homes. Yesterday we received news that Russian troops are holding hundreds of doctors and patients hostage. This is an insult to the whole world.”
White House Spokesperson Psaki stated that a legal process initiated by the US State Department and examining possible war crimes of Russian troops in Ukraine is continuing.
Earlier, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said his country was “closely examining” whether Russian forces were deliberately targeting civilians.
West-Russia relations
Biden’s remarks came after several statements he made in recent days on the rising tensions between the leaders of the US, Russia and Ukraine and the Russia-Ukraine war.
After the speech of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy to the US Congress yesterday, Biden announced that he will provide weapons to Ukraine. The US arms support to Ukraine has so far reached a value of 1 billion dollars.
On the other hand, Russian leader Putin said that the West is trying to divide Russia with lies and that he trusts the secret anti-Russian persons and organizations within the country.
“The Russian people can distinguish patriots from traitors and scumbags and accidentally spit in their mouth like a fly that flew into their mouth. Such a cleansing process also strengthens Russia,” Putin said.
Many Russian analysts say that Putin’s words are alarming.
Speaking to the New York Times, political analyst Tatiana Stanovaya said that Putin urged authorities in Russia to target “all segments of society that have sympathy for the Western way of life.”
Mikhail Kasyanov, who was the prime minister in Putin’s first government and later became the harshest critic of the Russian leader, stated that Putin was on the way to destroy Russia and started to apply mass pressure to those who oppose the Russian regime, “This has happened before in our history.” .
*North America Correspondent Anthony Zurcher**‘of* analysis:
Diplomatic bridges between the USA and Russia began to collapse one by one.
We’ve seen Biden improvise on major policy changes and decisions like this before.
At the White House, Biden’s answering the journalist’s question at first, saying no, and then changing his mind and saying that Putin is a war criminal will definitely complicate the relations between the USA and Russia in the future.
On the other hand, with these words, Biden admits that perhaps the political order of the world has changed and that he will never be able to return to his previous state.