Story by Business Insider |Natalie Musumeci | Pro-Kremlin Russian pundits are furious over US President Joe Biden’s surprise trip to Ukraine’s capital of Kyiv on Monday, criticizing Russia for allowing it to happen and calling it a “humiliation” for Moscow.
The White House gave Russian President Vladimir Putin “hours” notice before Biden’s unannounced trip, in which he met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and toured the capital, Kyiv.
Russian state TV host Sergey Mardan called Biden’s visit a “demonstrative humiliation of Russia” in a Telegram post to his more than 231,000 subscribers.
Mardan was angry Russia didn’t take action as it wages the “holy war that we are waging with the entire West.”
“Apparently, in a holy war lunch breaks happen,” he fumed.
Ex-Russian military commander Igor Girkin said in a Telegram post that Biden — who he referred to disparagingly as “grandfather” — could be taken to the front lines of the war in Bakhmut, Ukraine, and nothing would happen to him.
“Joe Biden arrived in Kyiv,” Girkin said. “I won’t be surprised if they will bring grandfather (he’s not good for anything, except for uncomplicated provocations anyway) to Bakhmut as well… AND NOTHING WILL HAPPEN TO HIM.”
Kremlin propagandists call Biden’s visit to Kyiv “a demonstrative humiliation.”
Get used to it. pic.twitter.com/CnFchJ7jpe
— Anton Gerashchenko (@Gerashchenko_en) February 20, 2023
Additionally, a Telegram account run by the Russian army and naval service members pointed out that Biden made it to Kyiv before Putin.
“Almost a year after the start of the Special Military Operation, in the Russian city of Kyiv we were waiting for the president of the Russian Federation, not the United States,” the post read.
When Putin launched his invasion of Ukraine nearly a year ago, he expected a swift victory and thought Russia’s military could capture Kyiv in two days.
But, Russian forces failed to take the Ukrainian capital and were driven back.
Anton Gerashchenko, an adviser to the Minister of Internal Affairs of Ukraine, called Biden’s visit to Kyiv the “most important one in the whole history of Ukraine-US relations” in a tweet.
“Kremlin propagandists call Biden’s visit to Kyiv ‘a demonstrative humiliation,'” Gerashchenko noted in another tweet, adding, “Get used to it.”
Biden met with Zelenskyy while in Kyiv on Monday to “reaffirm our unwavering and unflagging commitment to Ukraine’s democracy, sovereignty, and territorial integrity,” the US president said.
“When Putin launched his invasion nearly one year ago, he thought Ukraine was weak and the West was divided,” Biden said in a statement. “He thought he could outlast us. But he was dead wrong.”
Translations by Oleksandr Vynogradov
