Western sanctions against Russian Federation over Crimea a ‘silly decision’: Putin

Putin has had a close working relationship with Germany’s Merkel and in the interview he said he had met with her seven times in 2015 and they had spoken on the phone at least 20 times.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that he didn’t mean to scare Angela Merkel with his dog Koni at one of their first-ever meetings, a move that has left its mark on relations with the Chancellor ever since.

While Russia has since September 30 launched airstrikes in Syria, Mr Putin called on Western countries to collaborate more closely with Moscow in the fight against the Islamic State (IS) group.

Despite being ostracized by the West through the implementation of economic sanctions over the past two years, Russian Federation has been sought out by the worldwide community in recent times to help come to a solution over the war in Syria.

“Our soldiers have merely prevented the Ukrainian troops on Crimea from impeding the freedom of expression of the people”, Putin said. Putin said the Western expansion has been aggravating worldwide crises. “But now they are sitting there, and we are talking about all these crises we would otherwise not have”, Putin said.

“They wanted to sit on the throne in Europe alone….”

This resulted from the US’ desire for “complete victory over the Soviet Union” after the Cold War ended in 1991, Putin claimed. Crimea and Sevastopol, a city with a special status on the Crimean peninsula, where most residents are Russians, signed reunification deals with Russia on March 18, 2014 after a referendum, in which an overwhelming majority of Crimeans voted to secede from Ukraine and rejoin the Russian Federation.Mr Putin also said the leaders of Germany and France should not demand from Moscow, the things that should be done by Kiev.

While NATO pursued its “expansion to the east” agenda by allowing eastern European and former Soviet Baltic states like Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania to join the military alliance, Putin says major players should have “redefine[d] a zone in Central Europe that would not be accessible to NATO with its military structures”.

“All that would have been required to refrain from doing so was the political will. But people didn’t want to”, Putin said. “Last year, the gross domestic product had dropped by 3.8%”.

“Of course one always has to follow worldwide law”.

According to Moscow, the Russian strikes target only jihadist groups, including IS, while the West has accused Russia of also hitting other rebels fighting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad.

“The trade balance, however, is still positive”.