Putin to West: Respect our interests
Russian president says Iran should be rewarded for desire to reach nuclear compromise
President Vladimir Putin sternly urged the West to respect Russia’s interests in global affairs and defended his move to sanction the delivery of a long-range air defence missile system to Iran during a marathon TV call-in show with the nation yesterday.
Putin scathingly criticised Washington for refusing to see Moscow as an equal partner and warned that Russia-West ties, in shambles over the Ukrainian crisis, could only be normalised when the US and its allies show readiness for compromise. He focused heavily on economic issues during the show, a slickly produced hours-long annual affair intended to burnish his image.
Putin said the nation’s economic performance has remained strong, despite Western sanctions slapped on Russia over the Ukrainian crisis and a slump in global oil prices. He pointed at the rouble’s recovery as a sign of a renewed investor confidence in Russia.
Putin, whose approval ratings top 80 per cent despite the recession, said the country can overcome any challenges if it remains united.
“If we preserve a stable situation in domestic politics, preserve the current consolidation of society, we shouldn’t fear any threats,” he said.
Turning to foreign policy issues, Putin said his decision to lift a 2010 Russian ban on the delivery of the powerful S-300 air defence missile system to Iran followed a tentative deal on ending the Iranian nuclear stand-off reached by Tehran and six world powers earlier this month.
He said Iran should be rewarded for showing “a great degree of flexibility and a desire to reach a compromise” in the talks. Putin said that Russia would continue to cooperate with its international partners on negotiating a definitive nuclear deal with Iran. He argued that the international sanctions against Iran still in place don’t ban the delivery of the S-300, which Russia had halted voluntarily.
Putin scathingly criticised Washington for refusing to see Moscow as an equal partner and warned that Russia-West ties could only be normalised when the US and its allies show readiness for compromise
Russia has no plans to resurrect an empire but it will never be a “vassal” of the US, President Vladimir Putin said yesterday. “We have no imperial ambitions. But we can ensure that ethnic Russians living in countries close to us can live decently,” Putin said during his annual call-in show on Russian television.
The Russian President was referring to the Eurasian Economic Union, a group of former Soviet States that was formed earlier this year and faced accusations that it was dominated by Russia.
Asked about the strained relations with the US, Putin said that Washington needs no allies, only vassals. “Russia cannot exist in such a system,” he said.
Putin defended his policies in Ukraine, which caused the worst crisis between Moscow and the West since the Cold War, and blamed the Ukrainian leadership for lacking the political will to solve the conflict with pro-Russian separatists in the country’s east that has killed more than 6,000 people in the past year.
The four-hour-long show was overshadowed by the killing of Oles Buzina, a Ukrainian journalist well-known for his pro-Russian views, who was shot dead in Kiev as Putin was speaking. Asked about the crime, Putin linked it to a recent series of murders of government opponents in Ukraine and suggested that Ukraine’s failure to solve them hampers the country’s European ambitions.
“Both in Europe and in America they prefer not to take notice,” he complained. Late on Wednesday, Oleh Kalashnikov, a former lawmaker for the party of exiled President Viktor Yanukovych, was shot dead in Kiev.
Nemstov murder
However, Putin admitted that he did not know, if somebody had ordered the February 27 murder of Russian opposition figure Boris Nemtsov in Moscow, calling it “absolutely shameful and tragic.”
Asked if Nemtsov was killed because he had damning evidence of Russian troops in Ukraine, he merely reiterated that there are no Russian troops there.