🎙 Interview of Russia's President Vladimir Putin to TV host and Rossiya Segodnya Director General Dmitry Kiselev (March 13, 2024):

Key talking points

💬 Russia is not at the crossroads. It is on the strategic path of its development and will not deviate from its path.

#MultipolarWorld

• Many people in the world are looking at us, at what is happening in our country and in our struggle for our interests. <...> They associate our struggle for our independence and true sovereignty with their aspirations for their own sovereignty and independent development.

• This is aggravated by the fact that there is a very strong desire in Western elites to freeze the current unjust state of affairs in international affairs. They've spent centuries filling their bellies with human flesh and their pockets with money. But they must realise that the vampire ball is ending.

#Ukraine

• Are we ready to negotiate? We are. But we are not ready for talks that are based on some kind of ”wishful thinking“, but we are ready for talks based on the realities that have developed on the ground.

• We are open to a serious discussion, and we are eager to resolve all conflicts by peaceful means. However, we must be sure that this is not just another pause that the enemy wants to use for rearmament, but rather a serious conversation with security guarantees for Russia.

#US #RussiaUS

• We know what it is to have American troops on Russian soil. They are interventionists. That is how we will treat them even if they appear in the territory of Ukraine.

• I have said many times that it [achieving the goals of the special military operation & resolving the conflict] is a matter of life and death for us, while for them it is a matter of improving their tactical position in the world on the whole as well as maintaining their status among their allies in Europe in particular.

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🎙 President Vladimir Putin's address to the citizens of Russia (March 14, 2024)

💬 Vladimir Putin: Tomorrow, March 15, the polling stations will open across our vast country, and the three-day voting in the presidential election will begin.

This is the eighth time a presidential election will be held in Russia, which shows the inviolability of the principle of holding regular elections which is one of the basic principles of a democratic state. The outcome will directly affect the development of the country in the coming years.

This is an important high-stakes event and, as the incumbent head of state, I believe it is necessary to address you today.

I would like to emphasise that the people are the only source of power in our country. This key legal provision is enshrined in the Constitution. It means that only you, the citizens of Russia, determine the future of the Motherland.

<...>

Let me be frank with you: participating in the election today is a manifestation of patriotism. This is well understood by the residents of Donbass and Novorossiya who, under the most trying circumstances, voted during referendums on unity with Russia and will make their choice now as well.

<...>

It is imperative to confirm our unity and our resolve to move forward together. Your every vote is valuable and important. So, I urge you to exercise your right to vote during the next three days. Polling stations will open everywhere, in every city, town, and village of our large country.

All of us, the multi-ethnic people of Russia, are one big family. We care and worry about our native country. We want it to flourish, to be strong, free, and prosperous. We want the standard of living and quality of life to improve. And so it will be. We will do everything exactly the way we want it.

So, please come to the polling stations and make your civic and patriotic position clear, vote for the candidate of your choice, and for the prosperous future of our beloved Russia.

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🎙 Briefing by MFA Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova (Moscow, March 13, 2024)

🔹 FM Sergey Lavrov’s schedule
🔹 Ukrainian crisis
🔹 Russian Presidential Election 2024
🔹 10th Anniversary of Crimea’s reunification with Russia
🔹 On dismantling the monument to Waffen-SS Galicia Division in Oakville, Canada
🔹 Regarding the return Russian minors from combat zones and their social adaptation
🔹 Slobodan Milosevic’s death anniversary

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📺 Watch in full

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#Election2024

The Russian MFA Commission on Elections has done a lot of extensive work, with 288 polling stations established in 144 countries.

As the voting period approaches, we are recording an increasing number of attempts to interfere with the organisation and conduct of elections abroad and from abroad.

☝️ The full-fledged voting of Russian citizens abroad will be guaranteed despite any attempts to interfere in the domestic affairs of the Russian Federation.

#Ukraine #France

President Macron continues to talk about sending European military personnel to Ukraine. On March 7, at a meeting with parliamentarians, he did not rule out the option of sending a French contingent if the Russian army, as was said during that meeting, advances towards Kiev or Odessa.

Statements made by Macron and other NATO politicians about sending in contingents, troops or paramilitary units to Ukraine are related to dividing (from their point of view) what remains of Ukraine.

#Syria

A special flight operated by the Russian Aerospace Forces arrived in Moscow on March 10, 2024, carrying another group of 32 children on board. They came from camps for internally displaced persons in the northeast of the Syrian Arab Republic.

The MFA and the Russian Embassy in Damascus persist in their efforts to repatriate as quickly as possible all Russian children who found themselves in Syria due to their parents’ involvement in international terrorist activities.

According to Ms Lvova-Belova, as many as 414 Russian minors have already been successfully returned to Russia.

🎙 Excerpt from an interview with FM Sergey Lavrov for the Evening with Vladimir Solovyov programme on Rossiya 1 TV channel (March 14, 2024)

Key points:

💬Russia's President Vladimir Putin's Munich Speech included his analysis of the developments in relations between Moscow and the West, and the policy that the Westerners had initially opted for with regard to the new Russia. Some people [on the West] took it seriously. They were a minority. The majority ignored it, shrugged it off, or was outraged.

• After August 2008 [events] and before the Crimean Spring, our relations with the West had become increasingly open and, therefore, tense. Neither the EU, nor NATO wasn't willing to draw conclusions.

• In early 2022 the Ukrainian authorities got the green light to carry out an operation to mop up Donbass. Since the beginning of February 2022, the bombing attacks have intensified 10- to 12-fold.

• Even when there were still false hopes that the Minsk agreements would be implemented, when the Kiev regime was violating them by shelling Donbass, about 2 mln people left there for Russia. And even more did so after the special military operation was launched.

• It is impossible to fake, teach or learn using Stanislavsky’s system, the joy displayed by the people welcoming our soldiers. They have finally seen us come.

• The Russian MFA has representative offices in Lugansk and Donetsk. They will be established in the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions later. I want to go there and talk to the staff at our offices, to see what they need.

• What is happening now with the West is a frenzy. The worse the situation at the front, the more furious the West is talking – we don’t have the right to allow Ukraine to lose and Russia to win.

• We are saying that if you are ready to conduct honest talks taking into account our real concerns, Russia’s lawful interests about which we talked to you for many years but you won’t listen. If you return to what we had called for, let’s talk. But so far we don’t see any evidence

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