LONDON, March 18. /TASS/. US President Joe Biden’s remarks towards his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin are unacceptable among leaders of countries with diplomatic relations, but these remarks are not unprecedented, says Marcus Papadopoulos, a British political scientist.

Earlier, Biden said in an interview for ABC that Putin will have to "pay the price" for the alleged attempts at interfering in the US presidential elections. Besides, he also answered in an affirmative when asked whether he considers Putin a "killer."

"It is surprising but neither shocking nor unprecedented. I draw a comparison between Biden's words and Ronald Reagan’s description of USSR as ‘evil empire’ with both comments having been made at bitter relations between East and West," Papadopoulos said, referring to the US ex-president’s 1983 speech.

No diplomatic niceties

"That kind of language is simply unacceptable for world leaders to use about one another, especially when leaders of those countries have diplomatic relations with one another. After all, if you have diplomatic relations, inevitably there are diplomatic niceties; so it's one thing to say that the government is practicing a brutal war against another country, and it's another thing entirely to describe the leader of that country as a ‘killer’," the expert said.

"Relations between Moscow and Washington are atrocious. In my opinion, with the exception of the period of Cuban missile crisis, the relations between East and West today are equal to any time during the Cold War. So it's not of surprise that an American leader has resorted to this sort of language", he added.

However, he does not believe that this statement will have any kind of consequences.

"The Russians have withdrawn their Ambassador from Washington for consultations. Well, of course, this doesn't mean anything. Russia is not going to sever diplomatic relations with America, and it's simply - in the world of diplomacy - it's a way of Moscow to send its strongest form of a message to America to say how indignant the Kremlin is by Biden's description," Papadopoulos said.

Threats towards Russia

The expert considers Biden’s promised actions towards Russia to be more serious, however.

"His warning that Russia will pay the price it's very serious. That was a threat to Russia," the expert said.

He acknowledged that it is difficult to predict how exactly Washington intends to fulfill this threat.

"Does that mean there will be additional American sanctions placed on the Russian Federation? Does that mean that there will be an almighty cyber-attack on Russia, which will be carried out by Americans (but of course Americans will not own up to that)? Will something happen in Syria? Will America dramatically announce that it is going to increase its military presence on the western borders of the Russian Federation? We don't know; that could be something else. These are just my initial thoughts about that," Papadopoulos said.