US’ demand for Navalny’s release unacceptable: Russia

Washington, Feb 6 : Russia views US President Joe Biden’s call for the immediate release of opposition figure Alexei Navalny as aggressive and counterproductive, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.
“This is a very aggressive and unconstructive rhetoric, unfortunately,” TASS News Agency quoted the spokesman as saying to reporters at a briefing on Friday.
“Any hints of an ultimatum are absolutely unacceptable to us,” Peskov added He reiterated that Moscow will not heed such claims, saying that despite existing differences, Russia hopes the US will demonstrate “political will” to continue mutually beneficial communication.
“We hope that alongside a huge number of disagreements and differences in approaches to key issues, grounds for cooperation will still remain,” Peskov said.
In his first major foreign policy speech after taking office last month, Biden on Thursday demanded that Navalny be freed.