Kremlin Scolds United States for Casting Crimea as Legitimate Target

Vehicles drive over the bridge connecting the Russian mainland with the Crimean Peninsula across the Kerch Strait, February 14, 2023. (Reuters)

The Kremlin on Sunday cast the United States was a "major provocateur" of international tensions for condoning attacks on Crimea, warning that the remarks about the peninsula underscored the depth of disagreement between the two countries.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov was responding to comments by US Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland who said the United States considers that Crimea, which Russia annexed from Ukraine in 2014, should be demilitarized and that Washington supports Ukrainian attacks on military targets on the peninsula.