The US ambassador to Russia, John Sullivan, left Moscow today after concluding his mission in this country, which he arrived almost three years ago amid great tensions in the relations of the two nations, which are now at a standstill. due to the Russian military intervention in Ukraine.
“The US ambassador to the Russian Federation, John J. Sullivan has completed his stay as US envoy and left Moscow today,” the embassy said in a brief statement.
On Saturday Sullivan went to the Hall of Columns of the Moscow House of Trade Unions to pay tribute to Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the USSR who died this week in Moscow.
Chargé d’affaires Elizabeth Rood will take over the duties of the US legation until Sullivan’s successor arrives, retiring from a career that has spanned four decades under five US presidents.
Sullivan, who was deputy secretary of state and held other high-ranking positions in the Departments of Justice, Defense and Commerce, was appointed ambassador to Russia in December 2019.
The diplomat, who has always spoken out in favor of civil society and human rights in Russia, and who has harshly criticized the repression of the opposition, led by the imprisoned Alexei Navalny, had to deal with tensions between the US and Russia as soon as they arrive in Moscow.
In April 2021, he left Moscow on the recommendation of the Russian Foreign Ministry, the same month that Washington imposed sanctions on Russia and expelled ten diplomats for its alleged interference in the 2020 presidential election, its alleged role in the massive SolarWinds cyberattack and its actions in Ukraine and Afghanistan.
The Kremlin responded with similar measures, including the US on a list of “unfriendly countries”, limiting the hiring of local staff at the embassy and the movement of US diplomats on Russian territory.
His counterpart in the US, Anatoly Antonov, had been recalled a month earlier, when US President Joe Biden called his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, a “murderer.”
Both returned to their respective posts only after the Biden-Putin summit in Geneva in June 2021, but relations between the two countries only worsened rather than improved due to Russia’s war drums in Ukraine at the end of the year. of that year.
Currently relations between the US and Russia are non-existent, except for some work-level channels, due to Russia’s military intervention in the neighboring country. EFE
