On 10 August 2015, by order of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Zakharova was appointed director of the Information and Press Department. Zakharova became the first woman to hold this post. In 2016, she was chosen as one of
BBC's 100 Women. In 2017, Zakharova accused the
European Union of hypocrisy over its different behaviour towards the
separatist crises in
Crimea and
Catalonia, after hundreds were injured by Spanish security forces preventing Catalans from voting during the
Catalan independence referendum, saying "I see and read what is happening in Catalonia. And Europe will say something to us about the referendum in Crimea and the protection of human rights". On 28 April 2017, Zakharova appeared on
Yahoo! News discussing the current international relations with
Katie Couric. When Couric brought up the reports of
torture against LGBT individuals by the Chechen government, Zakharova said that Russia was conducting an investigation into the matter. in 2017,
Order of Friendship ceremony In June 2019,
Reuters reported that Zakharova "offered a tribute to those who died on the
western front of
World War II and said Moscow appreciated the Allied war effort", adding "It should of course not be exaggerated. And especially not at the same time as diminishing the Soviet Union's titanic efforts, without which this victory simply would not have happened". Zakharova stated, "As historians note, the
Normandy landing did not have a decisive impact on the outcome of World War II and the
Great Patriotic War. It had already been pre-determined as a result of the Red Army's victories, mainly at
Stalingrad (in late 1942) and
Kursk (in mid-1943). There was a wish to wait for the maximum weakening of Germany's military power from its enormous losses in the east, while reducing losses in the west." In 2021, Zakharova criticised a
NATO military exercise called
Defender-Europe 21, She claimed that by conducting these exercises, NATO is gathering a "strike fist" near Russia's borders.
Tenure during Russian invasion of Ukraine On 16 February 2022, Zakharova ridiculed Western media predictions of an imminent
invasion of Ukraine by Russia when she had mockingly asked for the schedule of Russian invasion so that she could, ostensibly, "plan [her] vacation" accordingly. On 28 February 2022, she wrote that "Russia did not start a war, it is ending it" and claimed that Russia was acting to end the "systematic extermination of the
Donbas population" that had allegedly been ongoing since 2014. On 5 April 2022, Zakharova criticized the US for its alleged attempts to remove
Prime Minister Imran Khan from office over his independent foreign policy, including his relations with Russia. On 2 June 2022, Zakharova warned that
Turkey's
invasion of northern Syria "would be a direct violation of Syria's sovereignty and territorial integrity" and would "cause a further escalation of tensions in Syria." On 15 June 2022, she praised Russia's
strategic partnership with
China, adding that "Energy supplies are steadily increasing: China knows what it wants and doesn't shoot itself in the foot. While to the west of Moscow, they shoot themselves in the head." On 5 July 2022, Zakharova said that
Israel's incursions and
strikes into southern Syria were "categorically unacceptable", and: "We strongly condemn such irresponsible actions that violate Syria's sovereignty and the basic norms of international law, and we demand their unconditional cessation." In January 2023, she recalled
France's
colonial past, saying that "French colonialism on the African continent has ended. The era when African countries had to ask someone, in particular France, before making a sovereign decision has ended." On 6 July 2023, U.S. president
Joe Biden approved the provision of
cluster munitions to Ukraine in support of a
Ukrainian counteroffensive against Russian forces in Russian-
annexed southeastern Ukraine. Zakharova said Washington's decision to supply Ukraine with cluster munitions showed the "aggressive anti-Russian course taken by the U.S., which is aimed at prolonging the conflict in Ukraine as much as possible." On 7 October 2023, following a
Hamas-led attack on Israel, she said that the
Israeli–Palestinian conflict "cannot be solved by force, but only by diplomatic means" and called "for the creation of an independent Palestinian state within the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as its capital, living in peace and security with Israel." In December 2023, she declared that
peace in the
Russo-Ukrainian War could only be achieved if Ukraine accepted "new territorial realities" and a neutral status, saying that "We will not allow the existence on our borders of an aggressive Nazi state from whose territory there is a danger for Russia and its neighbours." She also said that
China was a "like-minded partner" and Russia had developed ties with many countries in
Asia,
Africa, the
Middle East and
Latin America. According to Zakharova, Russia offers "honest and good-faith co-operation not based on diktat". Zakharova pointed out that 80% of the world's population lived in countries that had not adopted any
sanctions against Russia. In March 2024, she refused to blame the
Islamic State – Khorasan Province (IS-K) for the
Crocus City Hall attack in Moscow and instead accused the United States of using Islamic State as a "
bogeyman" to cover for Ukraine. On 10 August 2024, she condemned the
Al-Tabaeen school attack in
Gaza, stating that it undermine international efforts to de-escalate the
Gaza war and reach an urgent ceasefire and prisoner-captive exchange. On 11 August 2024, Zakharova protested against the
Ukrainian incursion into the Kursk Oblast, stating that Ukraine "is continuing its terrorist activity with the sole purpose of intimidating the peaceful population of Russia" and that the incursion "makes no sense from a military point of view." On 17 August 2024,
The Washington Post reported, citing anonymous diplomatic sources, that Ukraine's incursion into Russia disrupted
plans for indirect talks in Qatar to halt mutual
strikes on energy infrastructure in Ukraine and
Russia. Zakharova said that there were "no direct or indirect negotiations between Russia and Ukraine on the safety of civilian critical infrastructure facilities" and that after the assault on the Kursk Oblast, Putin ruled out the possibility of such talks. On 20 August 2024, she condemned the
Verkhovna Rada's vote to ban the
Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the Moscow Patriarchate (UOC-MP), accusing Ukraine of trying to "destroy true Orthodoxy." In May 2025, Zakharova called on both parties involved in the
Indo-Pakistani conflict to exercise restraint. In June 2025, when it was announced that
Blaise Metreweli, whose grandfather
Constantine Dobrowolski had been a
Nazi collaborator in occupied Ukraine, was appointed
Chief of the Secret Intelligence Service in the United Kingdom, Zakharova said that it was part of a trend of putting "descendants of the Nazis in leadership positions in the countries of the collective West". In October 2025, she criticized
US sanctions against Russia's largest oil companies
Rosneft and
Lukoil. In January 2026, Zakharova condemned the ongoing
anti-government protests in Iran, describing them as an attempt at a "colour revolution" orchestrated from abroad. == Sanctions ==