As Trump thaws ties, Russia has a new public enemy number one: Britain

Russia's foreign intelligence service calling Britain «a warmonger.» And a threat from a top ally of Vladimir Putin to seize UK assets inside Russia.

As the U.S. under Donald Trump seeks to reset ties with Moscow and broker peace between Russia and Ukraine, Britain has been granted the status of Russia's public enemy number one.
It's a mantle it has held on and off over the past two centuries.

«London today, like on the eve of both World Wars of the last century, is acting as the main global 'warmonger',» Russia's foreign intelligence service said in an unusually charged public statement on Monday. It accused London of trying to derail Trump's efforts to broker peace in Ukraine.

«The time has come to expose them and send a clear message to 'perfidious Albion' and its elites: you will not succeed,» the agency, known as SVR, said.

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It did not elaborate on its objections to Britain's behaviour prior to the two World Wars.
Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022 has become Europe's biggest and deadliest conflict since World War Two. It has left hundreds of thousands of dead and injured, displaced millions more, and triggered the sharpest confrontation between Moscow and the West in decades.

For most of the war, Russia lambasted Washington for its role in supplying aid to Kyiv. With Trump in office, that has changed.
Three Russian officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorised to speak to the media, said Britain was now regarded as Moscow's main foe, with one fuming that London was «stoking chaos and war» in Ukraine.
Another described Britain as the driving force in the West when it came to galvanising opposition to Russia.
Prime Minister Keir Starmer's talk this month of