SAN FRANCISCO, Feb 22 — President Joe Biden called his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin a "crazy SOB” at a public fundraising event Wednesday in California.

"We have a crazy SOB like that guy Putin, and others, and we always have to worry about nuclear conflict, but the existential threat to humanity is climate,” Biden said in a brief speech at the event in San Francisco that was attended by a small group of reporters.

Biden’s burst of strong language follows other occasions in which he has called the Russian president, who ordered the invasion of Ukraine in 2022, a "butcher” and a "war criminal.”

Biden has said the United States will announce a package of tough new sanctions Friday against Russia over the death in prison of opposition leader Alexei Navalny.

In a hot mic slip in January 2022, Biden called a Fox News journalist a "son of a bitch.” — AFP