In Trump We Trust: Inauguration prompts celebration in Russia
Source: Reuters
(Reuters) - The Kremlin may have spent years reviling America, but Russians hoping Donald Trump will usher in a new era of detente marked his inauguration on Friday with parties and trinkets from commemorative coins to "matryoshka" nesting dolls in his image.
Washington was turned into a virtual fortress with an estimated 900,000 people -- backers and protesters -- descending on the capital. In London, anti-Trump activists draped a banner reading "Build Bridges Not Walls" from Tower Bridge. Protests were planned across western Europe on Friday and Saturday.
But according to Gennady Gudkov, a Putin critic and former lawmaker, Russia is in the grip of "Trumpomania", with state media giving the President-elect blanket air time at the expense of more mundane and sometimes depressing domestic news stories.
That, he said, was in part because the U.S. election, unlike elections in Russia, had been unpredictable. The Kremlin is hoping Trump will ease sanctions imposed over the annexation of Crimea, team up with Russia against Islamic State, and cut back NATO military activity near Russian borders.
Read more: https://www.google.com/amp/mobile.reuters.com/article/amp/idUSKBN1541S6?client=safari
It is as if the Russians themselves won the Presidency.
= new reply since forum marked as read
