Poroshenko: Russia boosting military in Ukraine’s east

He denied Russian regular troops were deployed in rebel-held eastern Ukraine but said there could be “people there who were carrying out certain tasks including in the military sphere”.

“They have never been educated anywhere except Russia”, Putin told his annual news conference.

Earlier, during a question and answer session, the Russian president was asked what he thought about the USA presidential race, and said he was ready to work with whomever the American people chose.

“He’s a very lively man, talented without doubt”, Putin said according to the Interfax news service after the three-hour news conference.

“These measures are meant to protect Russia’s economic interests”, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists, citing a lack of protection for the Russian market once Kiev’s free trade agreement with the European Union goes into effect.

Many Western leaders have said that Assad, who is blamed for the deaths of tens of thousands of his citizens, can not be part of Syria’s future.

On another matter, Putin said the decision to block Russian tourists from traveling to Egypt was not taken as a punitive measure.

In the Reuters report, Putin spoke positively of Trump’s views to engage with Russian Federation saying, “He says that he wants to move to another level of relations, to a deeper level of relations with Russian Federation”.

Putin said today that the peak of Russia’s economic crisis had passed and that there were signs of “stabilising business activity” starting in the second quarter. After a Turkish fighter jet shot down a Russian bomber along the Syrian border on November 24, Putin said he was stunned that Ankara, instead of contacting Moscow to explain its actions, turned immediately to North Atlantic Treaty Organisation.

Putin declined to comment on the USA presidential campaign.

Putin also addressed his country’s role in Ukraine’s civil war, where Russian Federation supports separatists in the Donetsk region.

Putin, who has largely led the country as either president or prime minister since being anointed prime minister in 1999 by his predecessor, Boris Yeltsin, gave no indication he was on track to relax his grip on power or shake up his inner circle.

“I believe we will have a very good relationship with Russian Federation”.

Last month, Trump said during the Republican presidential debate that he got to know the Russian president “very well, because we were both on 60 minutes, we were stablemates and we did very well that night”.

Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Thursday the $50 per barrel price for oil factored in the 2016 budget was too optimistic and the government needed to make adjustments.