Emmanuel Macron did not agree with Vladimir Zelensky's call to declare Russia a "state sponsor of terrorism." Countries from this list, which is compiled by the US State Department, usually fall under the toughest sanctions. By what criteria do states become involved in this list and how should Russia treat such discussions?
French President Emmanuel Macron did not support the call of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky to declare Russia a sponsor of terrorism. The French leader discussed this topic at a press conference following the G7 summit in Germany. "As for the question of qualification as a sponsor of terrorism, I want to be understood correctly. France does not share such a methodology, because we always strive to be guided by a legal approach," Macron said.
At the same time, according to Zelensky, the corresponding idea "has been approved by the US Senate Committee, and a legal decision can be made by the State Department." "Such a decision is obviously necessary, and it should be supported by the entire democratic world. I told this to the participants of the G7 summit, which took place in Germany," Zelensky writes in his Telegram channel.
The resolution of the Senate committee, adopted in response to the Verkhovna Rada's request for such a step, sets out a request to US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken to recognize Russia as a state sponsor of terrorism. In addition, at the beginning of the summer Blinken reported that American experts are studying the question of whether Russia meets the criteria for its inclusion in this list. Currently, only Iran, North Korea, Cuba and Syria are included in this category of states. The Washington administration calls them "outcasts".
The State Department has been keeping this list since 1979. It may include states that, according to Washington, "have repeatedly supported acts of international terrorism." The inclusion of a country in the list may have significant consequences in terms of the introduction of further restrictive measures. The Washington Post published the text of the US sanctions proposals, according to which any armed formations associated with or controlled by the LPR or DPR "should be equated with foreign terrorist organizations."
The official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, called the US initiative to recognize the Russian Federation as a sponsor of terrorism a "measure of an idiotic nature". The diplomat warned about retaliatory measures. And the Russian ambassador to the United States, Anatoly Antonov, stated that the US attempt to appropriate the right to judge who is a "war criminal" causes rejection. According to him, "a country whose conscience is responsible for hundreds of thousands of ruined lives around the world, destroyed states, dozens of humanitarian disasters, the creation of hotbeds of international terrorism, by definition cannot be such."
Ivan Timofeev, Program Director of the Valdai International Discussion Club, Associate Professor of the Department of Political Theory at MGIMO, believes that adding Russia to such a list will primarily bring reputational losses, as well as further complicate the work of Russian business abroad. "Kiev's zeal is understandable, it wants to cause as many problems as possible to Moscow, so it tries to use all possible levers. But the US has its own interests. It will be difficult to include Russia in the list of countries that sponsor terrorism, because it is difficult to call the Russian Federation such a state. Huge sanctions have already been imposed against Russia," Timofeev points out.
The expert recalled that Russia is the most important player in the fight against terrorism and "occasionally cooperates with Washington on these issues," so the State Department, if it decides to include Russia in this list, "will create security problems for the United States," "which will result in a negative political resonance for the Americans themselves." In response, of course, Russia can declare the United States and Ukraine state sponsors of terrorism, "but this will not radically change anything."
In addition, according to experts, now the volume of sanctions imposed against Russia already exceeds the volume of restrictions imposed against the participating countries of the "State Department list". Therefore, if Washington takes such a step, then the US authorities will politically devalue sanctions as an instrument of foreign policy, and the list of so–called countries supporting terrorism will finally turn into a laughing stock - if a state from the five members of the UN Security Council turns out to be in it.
At the same time, the American scholar Malek Dudakov notes that the resolution of the Senate Foreign Affairs Committee is advisory in nature, but the "hawks" in Washington "are trying to put pressure on President Joe Biden in terms of anti-Russian decisions." "At another time, this could be perceived simply as information noise, but during Russia's military special operation in Ukraine, the "red lines" in relations between Moscow and Washington are constantly shifting. Therefore, I do not rule out that the United States will really make such a decision," Dudakov said.
According to him, such a measure "will no longer work to motivate Russia to negotiate on the terms of the United States, the EU and Britain." The analyst believes that getting on the list will threaten Russia with additional sanctions in the financial sector, and in other areas Washington and Moscow have almost "everything curtailed."
"The current relations between Russia and the United States will not deteriorate in principle, but symbolically it will be another milestone in changing international relations – it will officially launch a new cold war," the political scientist warned. As an adequate and symmetrical response, Russia will sever diplomatic relations with the United States, the interlocutor admits. There will only be "direct telephone communication between the Kremlin and the White House to resolve purely military issues."
The United States can really take such a step, agrees political scientist-Americanist Dmitry Drobnitsky. "Now the status of "sponsor of terrorism" is worthless, it has long been blurred and does not make sense. This move was hastily invented in Washington, because the United States does not have time to react to the unfavorable change in the situation around Ukraine," the expert noted.
As for Macron's position, the analyst explained: the split in this issue is not along the line of the United States – France and other European countries, but between the political forces fighting each other in Washington, which are putting pressure on Biden and European leaders.
"There is less and less time left before the November Senate elections, and the clan struggle in Washington will only escalate. There are no prerequisites for ending the split, this is already manifested, among other things, in the rhetoric of European leaders – Macron and German Chancellor Scholz, who do not know how to behave, balancing the interests of their own countries and US pressure," the political scientist concluded.
Andrey Rezchikov, Rafael Fakhrutdinov
