Poll shows US image in Russia has deteriorated

An opinion poll shows that the Russians’ perception of the US role in the world has deteriorated over the past year, hitting the lowest point since 2009.

The poll was conducted by GlobeScan/PIPA from December 2012 to April 2013.

Fifty-three percent of the respondents regarded the global influence of the United States as “mainly negative.”

The survey indicated that only 17 percent of the Russian respondents viewed the US influence in the world as “mainly positive.” Thirty percent either viewed the role as “neutral” or they did not answer, RIA Novosti news agency reported on Thursday.

Meanwhile, around 23 percent of respondents to the poll in the US said they have a “mainly positive” view of Russia’s influence in the world.

In 2009, just seven percent of respondents in Russia had a positive view of the global influence of the US, while 65 percent deemed it largely negative.

There have been a variety of issues between Moscow and Washington over the past months, including a ban on Americans adopting Russian children.

On December 28, 2012, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed the Dima Yakovlev law, which bans Americans from adopting Russian children.

The bill is named after a Russian toddler who died in 2008 of heat stroke due to the negligence of his adoptive father – an American.

On April 13, 2013, Russia released a list of 18 Americans who were banned from entering Russia over alleged human rights violations.

Moscow and Washington also saw another turn of developments on May 14, when Russian authorities detained a US diplomat on allegations of attempting to recruit a Russian national to spy for the CIA.