Sergei Karpukhin/Reuters
The Kremlin’s spokesman has urged President-elect Donald Trump to begin repairing U.S.-Russia relations by pressuring NATO to withdraw forces from the Russian border. Dmitry Peskov, President Vladimir Putin’s official mouthpiece, said this “would lead to a kind of detente in Europe.” Peskov said in an interview with the Associated Press that the presence of NATO troops near its borders keeps relations tense, as Russia cannot feel “safe.” “Of course, we have to take measures to counter,” he was cited as saying. Trump repeatedly praised Putin throughout his campaign and echoed the Kremlin’s stance on NATO, at one point even defying Article 5 of the treaty by refusing to commit to defending NATO allies in the Baltics. His detractors have warned that his fondness for Russia may mean unprecedented interference by the Kremlin in U.S. policies, and Peskov’s recent comments appear to be the first indication of that in Trump’s upcoming term.