MOSCOW, November 25. /TASS/. The Kremlin will announce who the new Russian ambassador to the United States will be once the relevant decree is signed, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Monday.
"We will inform you immediately, as soon as the decree on the appointment [of the new Russian ambassador to the United States] is signed," Peskov told journalists. "As you all know well, we do not make announcements regarding new appointments in advance."
Russia’s Kommersant daily reported last week, citing its three unnamed sources, that the Russian Foreign Ministry's North America Department Director Alexander Darchiyev had been tapped for the post.
However, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement later that it would refrain from making public comments on the possible nomination of the country’s new ambassador to the United States citing legal restrictions.
Previously, Russian President Vladimir Putin dismissed Anatoly Antonov as Russia’s Ambassador to the United States. On October 5, the US Embassy told TASS that Antonov was wrapping up his mission in Washington and the diplomat returned to Moscow the next day.
Antonov, 69, has served as Russia’s Ambassador to the United States since 2017. He headed the Russian Embassy during the most turbulent period in the history of Moscow-Washington relations.
The past few years have seen quite an unprecedented worsening of bilateral ties, which Russia blames on the United States. At that, Washington has imposed restrictions on Russian diplomats working in the United States. In 2017, it closed Russia’s Consulate General in San Francisco, California, and ordered the closure of the Russian diplomatic mission in Seattle, Washington, in 2018.
On November 20, Peskov told journalists that the Kremlin had already decided on the candidacy of Russia’s new ambassador to the United States, and his appointment could be expected in the nearest future.