Putin unaware whom to congratulate – Trump or Biden

Russian President Vladimir Putin will congratulate the US President-elect on his victory only after the election results are announced officially, official spokesman for the Russian president, Dmitry Peskov said. Putin will show respect for any choice of the American people and would be ready to work with any elected president, Peskov added.

Answering the question why the Russian president congratulated Donald Trump on his election victory without waiting for the official announcement in 2016, Peskov said that "the difference is quite obvious," as this time the sitting US president announced "certain legal procedures." Four years ago, Putin was one of the first to congratulate Trump on the day after the election.

Peskov added that regardless of the outcome of the vote, Russia hopes to establish a dialogue with the President-elect of the United States and agree on ways to normalize bilateral relations, RBC reports.

"Moreover, a significant part of these bilateral relations - stability and security - concerns not only our two nations, but in fact the peoples of the whole world," Peskov added.

It is worthy of note that in August of 2020, after the presidential election in Belarus, Putin became one of the first to congratulate Alexander Lukashenko on his victory even though the official results of the election was not announced.

The US presidential election took place on November 3, but the vote counting still continues due to the record turnout and an unprecedented number of ballots received by mail. On November 7, leading American media announced Democratic nominee Joe Biden as President-elect. According to their calculations, he received 270 electoral votes required for the election.

Biden then addressed the nation with a speech, in which he promised to become a president "not to divide but to unify" the nation.

Many world leaders congratulated the democrat on his victory:

• British Prime Minister Boris Johnson
• French President Emmanuel Macron
• German Chancellor Angela Merkel
• Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau
• Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Israeli President Reuven Rivlin
• Venezuelan President Nicholas Maduro
• Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky.

Still, Donald Trump does not admit his defeat and is challenging the election results at courts. On November 9, his campaign headquarters filed a lawsuit in Arizona. In Michigan and Georgia, Trump's lawsuits were dismissed. In Pennsylvania, Trump's headquarters are suing Philadelphia electoral officials, where the counting resumed on November 7.