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President Vladimir Putin hit out at the new U.S. and EU ambassadors to Russia for what he said was their countries' responsibility for a dramatic deterioration in relations since the escalation of the Ukraine conflict last year.
The U.S. and EU ambassadors were among 17 representatives who were formally presenting their diplomatic credentials to Putin at the Kremlin.
Putin used the opportunity to tell the new U.S. ambassador Lynne Tracy that U.S. support for the ousting of Ukraine's pro-Russian government in 2014 had led to the current situation where Moscow and Kyiv were in conflict.
He added that relations were in "a deep crisis" that was "based on fundamentally different approaches to the formation of the modern world order."
"Dear Madam Ambassador, I know you may not agree, but I cannot but say that the United States' use ... of such tools as support for the so-called 'color revolutions,' support in this regard for the coup in Kyiv in 2014, ultimately led to today's Ukrainian crisis," Putin said.
Moscow responded to the uprising in Kyiv by seizing the Crimean peninsula from Ukraine while backing pro-Russian separatists in the country's east.
Putin also told the new EU ambassador, Roland Galharague, who started in September, that "the European Union initiated a geopolitical confrontation with Russia."
Putin went on to urge Denmark to support Russia's proposal to establish an independent international commission to investigate the blasts that damaged the Nord Stream gas pipelines, a key route for Russian gas to reach Europe, last September.
The Russian president in his opening remarks stressed his country was still open to constructive partnership with every country and would not isolate itself, despite the current complex global situation.
（Reuters）
