The stores and stripes: Russian shops show their anti-US sentiment by putting out American flag doormats for customers to wipe their feet on
- Resentful Russian traders are using U.S. flags as doormats in their stores
- Customers are using them to wipe their feet as they enter and exit shops
- U.S. and European economic sanctions are squeezing traders
Russian business owners are using American flags as doormats as resentment over U.S. economic sanctions puts the squeeze on traders.
Customers have been filmed wiping their feet on the fabled stars and stripes as they enter and exit stores across Moscow, as struggling retailers take a hopeless swipe at their Cold War adversaries.
Negotiations between the two nations are currently deadlocked over Russia's involvement in the Ukrainian crisis and the U.S. has initiated hard-hitting economic sanctions to try and force a compromise.
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A customer wipes his feet on the stars and stripes as he enters a Moscow supermarket
The doormats are being used by retailers in a novel attempt to show their anti-U.S. sentiments
In the video, the store owners' anti-U.S. sentiment is clear, as doormats emblazoned with the U.S. flag are positioned in doorways and corridors.
Customers are then filmed walking on the flags as they enter and exit the stores.
While recently announced U.S. sanctions have been dismissed by the Kremlin as useless, stabilizing the ruble, which is one of the world's worst-performing currencies this year following the sanctions imposed on Russia for its involvement in Ukraine, is a priority for Russia's monetary authorities.
The country's statistics agency reported today that consumer prices rose 0.9 percent last week when the ruble was in freefall - there was clear evidence last week that retailers of imported products, such as electronics and cars, were raising prices in the wake of the ruble's fall.
The weekly rise was the biggest since records began in 2008.
Measures taken include last week's increase in the Central Bank's main interest rate to a whopping 17 percent in the hope that it makes holding rubles more attractive for traders.
A woman walks across two U.S. flag doormats at a retail store in Moscow
The supermarket (pictured) owners used the doormats to take a small swipe at the U.S.
And in a bid to boost hard currency offering at the markets, the government has encouraged major companies to sell more hard currency.
Yesterday, it formally instructed five of the country's biggest state-controlled exporters to reduce their foreign currency assets to October levels and to not raise them again until March.
However the ruble performs over the coming days and weeks, the Russian economy is predicted to fall into recession next year and inflation to spike - many forecasters expect the annual inflation rate to double from the current 10 percent.
Some, like ex-Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin, are warning of a full-blown crisis.
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