Russia Ready For Limited Flexibility In Ties With US - Kremlin

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 24th January, 2021) Russia is open to the idea of being flexible in its relationship with the new US administration but there will be red lines, a presidential spokesman said on Sunday.

"Flexibility is an integral element of international relations. We are ready to be flexible but we are not ready to be commanded, be talked down to, have our red lines crossed. Otherwise, we have displayed the required flexibility. But there are to be limits to it," Dmitry Peskov told the Rossiya 1 television channel.

Looking back at the US-Russian relationship immediately after the Soviet collapse, Peskov said Russians anticipated a "honeymoon with the world's biggest power" that would bring them democracy.

"We applauded when it cut up our submarines to make needles, when we sawed and hacked apart our Strategic Aviation," he said.

But follow-up events revealed double standards in the budding relationship. He said Russia had rejected the coup in Ukraine and suggestions that it should hand over US whistleblower Edward Snowden, adding these were "the very red lines that must not be crossed."