America recognizes Vladimir Putin as president of Russia, but will not send a US representative to his inauguration. This was stated by US State Department spokesman Matthew Miller during a briefing.

“We definitely do not recognize the presidential election in Russia as free and fair. However, Putin is the president of Russia and will continue to act in this role, but our representative will not be at his inauguration,” Miller said.

It is worth noting that despite the mutual escalating rhetoric between the Kremlin and Paris in recent days, France has said that its representative will attend Putin's inauguration.

Reuters notes that Germany has decided to boycott the inauguration, and that Paris's decision will mean a split between the EU leaders.


Earlier, we reported that Ukraine sees no legal grounds for recognizing Putin as a democratically elected and legitimate president of the Russian Federation.