U.S. President Donald Trump’s decision to sign a law expanding sanctions on Russia will hinder efforts to end the war in Ukraine and further damage relations between Moscow and Washington, the Kremlin said Monday.
“The signing of this document is certainly something that doesn’t contribute to the resuscitation of our bilateral relations,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters during a daily briefing.
“It is also of course unlikely to contribute to more successful progress along the path toward a settlement in Ukraine,” Peskov said.
The law, which Trump signed Friday, authorizes the U.S. president to impose punitive tariffs of up to 100% on China, India and other countries over their purchases of Russian oil and gas.
Peskov, who was careful not to criticize Trump directly, said Russia’s trading partners “unanimously reject” the tariffs, which would act as secondary sanctions.
Earlier on Monday, India’s Trade Minister Piyush Goyal said New Delhi was studying the details of the tariffs, which have yet to be imposed. Indian officials had said last week that the country intends to maintain energy imports through “diversified sourcing.”
The Chinese commerce ministry said this weekend that Beijing reserves the right to “take all necessary measures to firmly safeguard China’s national sovereignty and development interests, as well as the legitimate and just rights and interests of Chinese companies.”
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky thanked Trump for signing the sanctions legislation, the initial version of which was introduced into the Senate by the late U.S. Senator Lindsey Graham.
Zelensky also said he is scheduled to meet with the U.S. president in New York on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly this week.
Russia’s Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev called for a military response to the U.S. sanctions legislation.
“Even across the ocean, they hear only the language of direct military deterrence, and that’s the language in which we should respond to Russophobic atrocities such as the law of the dead terrorist Graham,” Medvedev said.
Reuters and AFP contributed reporting.
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