It would be pointless to step up the promotion of Russia's image given the ongoing information warfare, the Kremlin said.
"The ongoing information hysteria or, actually, an information war waged on Russia, are hardly helping to boost the image promotion efforts," Kremlin press secretary Dmitry Peskov told Interfax.
He confirmed that the Kremlin had stopped using services of the Ketchum PR agency to promote the image of Russia in foreign countries.
"Indeed, we had suspended our contract with the agency earlier and now the contract had come to an end," Peskov said.
However, Russia "will continue to explain its opinion on various issues and dimensions of the domestic and foreign policy in a well-reasoned and consistent manner," the press secretary observed.
He also underscored that Russia "possessed the entire range of instruments for carrying on its communication efforts."
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