The Kremlin has adopted a brand new international coverage doctrine which identifies the US because the “primary supply of threats” to Russian safety whereas describing Russia as a “distinctive state-civilisation” with a “distinctive historic mission”.
The doc is the primary replace to the doctrine since 2016 and displays the “radical adjustments within the worldwide affairs”, President Vladimir Putin advised a gathering of his Safety Council on Friday.
Presenting the brand new technique, international minister Sergei Lavrov stated Russia confronted an “existential risk” from “unfriendly nations”.
The brand new doctrine describes the US because the “primary supply” of safety threats to Russia and alludes to an “period of revolutionary adjustments” in the direction of a “extra simply multipolar world” — wording meant to mirror the rising energy of China beneath President Xi Jinping.
Putin and Xi agreed to a “no limits partnership” shortly earlier than the Russian president ordered a full-scale invasion of Ukraine final yr.
Regardless of Moscow’s conflict of aggression in opposition to its neighbour, the coverage doc depicts Russia as “peaceable, open, and predictable”. It accuses the US of utilizing its “particular army operation” in Ukraine as a pretext to unleash a “hybrid conflict” geared toward “weakening and disintegrating Russia”.
Moscow has in current weeks ramped up tensions with the US and allies. Earlier this month, Putin ordered the stationing of Russian tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus by this summer time. And this week, Russian safety brokers detained Evan Gershkovich, a US reporter primarily based in Moscow, on espionage fees.
Belarus chief Alexander Lukashenko stated on Friday he was discussing the deployment of nuclear weapons on its territory along with his Russian counterpart.
Lukashenko advised his nation’s parliament that he had began negotiations with Putin on “the return of nuclear weapons withdrawn within the Nineteen Nineties to Belarus”.
“We are going to cease at nothing to guard our nations and our individuals,” he stated.
Whereas Russia’s new international coverage technique acknowledges the US’s function as “an influential growth centre”, it portrays Washington as “the organiser and executor of anti-Russian coverage of the collective West”. It marks a pointy distinction to the final doctrine, which expressed a need to construct “working relations with the US”.
In line with the idea, China and India are seen as “pleasant sovereign international centres of energy” that share Russia’s view of the “future world order”. Iran, Turkey, Saudi Arabia and Egypt are additionally seen as key allies.
“Identical to Stalin, Putin sees the world divided into the spheres of affect, into which the good powers compete to realize extra allies,” stated Andrei Kolesnikov, a senior fellow within the Carnegie Endowment for Worldwide Peace. He argues that the thought of “friendship” for Putin exists throughout the similar framework: “the extra allies you’ve got, the better energy you might be”.
Regardless of nearer China-Russian relations, Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov expressed scepticism over a putative peace plan for the conflict in Ukraine proposed by Beijing. Peskov stated China’s plan contained provisions which can be “unattainable” due to the stance taken by Kyiv.
In line with the brand new doctrine, Russia has a “distinctive mission” to keep up the worldwide steadiness of energy and create a multipolar worldwide system. The doc additionally refers to Russia not simply as a state however a “civilisation”.
Kolesnikov stated that the idea of Russia’s “particular path” is extra fleshed out than in earlier upgrades. “The idea displays the philosophy of the state which has reached the height stage of isolationism and imperialism,” he added.
