🎙 President Vladimir Putin's answers to questions from the Moscow. Kremlin. Putin programme (December 17, 2023)

❓Question: You said that the US is pursuing an imperial policy, and that [US President] Biden claims that if Putin is not stopped in Ukraine, then that means Russia will attack NATO.

💬 This is complete nonsense, and I believe President Biden understands this as well. It is just a figure of speech to justify his misguided policy towards Russia. This policy is misguided because I don't think that the US is as interested today, in terms of global development, as it was 20 years ago, in inflicting, as they publicly claim, a “strategic defeat” on Russia. I don't think it aligns with the national interests of the US itself. That's the first point.

Secondly, the president of any major NATO country, especially sole NATO master (and the US is the master of NATO, and all of NATO is their backyard) cannot fail to realise that Russia has no reason, no interest – be it geopolitical, economic, political or military – to wage war against NATO countries. We have no territorial claims against each other, and we harbour no intentions to jeopardise our relations with them. We are interested in developing relations.

They [the US] dragged Finland into NATO. Did we have any disputes with Finland? All disputes, including territorial ones, were solved long ago, in the middle of the XX century. We enjoyed the most kind, cordial relations, including economic relations. Everything was developing. <...> There were no problems. And now there will be because we will create the Leningrad Military District and deploy certain military units there.

Do we have a problem with anyone? No we don't. It is they who artificially create problems with us, because they do not want to have Russia as their competitor. That is all.

❓Question: How can we find common ground when there are accusations from all sides?

💬 They will have to find common ground with us, because they will have to reckon with our perspective.

🎙 Интервью С.В.Лаврова программе «Большая игра» на «Первом канале» (Москва, 18 декабря 2023 года)

📰 Читать интервью: http://tiny.cc/sl8jvz
📺 Смотреть интервью: http://tiny.cc/vl8jvz

Основные тезисы:

▫ Прекрасно понимаем (как говорили ещё много лет назад), что всё это – не про Украину, а про сдерживание России. Киев был нужен только для того, чтобы создать из него инструмент постоянных военных угроз Российской Федерации, инструмент истребления нашего влияния вплоть до того, что уничтожались русские традиции, язык, культура, да и сами русские физически.

▫ Ежедневно слышим о том, что американцы (да и остальные западные страны это повторяют) не участвуют в боевых действиях, а лишь «поддерживают» Украину, которая ведёт «справедливую» войну за свой суверенитет, территориальную целостность и за европейские ценности. Есть множество фактов, в том числе в видеопространстве о наёмниках из Польши и других европейских стран. Даже из некоторых ближневосточных стран, где американцы, в частности в Сирии, до сих пор держат военную базу Эт-Танф, на которой вольготно себя чувствуют боевики ИГИЛ. Некоторые из которых уже «засветились» на Украине.

▫ В нашей новой редакции Концепции внешней политики впервые использован термин, что Россия – это государство-цивилизация. Это ко многому обязывает. Это констатация объективного факта, подтверждающего то, что мы им являемся.

▫ У нас нет никаких территориальных споров со странами НАТО. У нас, в общем-то, уже больше ни с кем не существует территориальных споров. В том числе и с Японией закрыты все территориальные споры.

▫ Опять же, для сравнения: Европа, да и США сейчас «носятся» на Ближнем Востоке, призывая ливанцев, иранцев, иракцев, сирийцев сделать всё, чтобы война в Газе не распространилась на прилегающие территории. Наверное, им нужно применить такой же свой пыл к тому, чтобы подобного не произошло и на Украине.

#Лавров #Интервью #Европа #ЕС #США #НАТО #Украина #БлижнийВосток

🇷🇺🇪🇬✉️ President of Russia Vladimir #Putin sent a message of congratulations to President of the Arab Republic of Egypt Abdel Fattah el-Sisi on his re-election as President.

✍️ The message reads, in part:

“Your convincing victory in the election has become a prime example of the wide recognition of your efforts in addressing the current socioeconomic and foreign policy challenges facing Egypt.

It is hard to overestimate your personal contribution to building and strengthening the Russian-Egyptian strategic partnership. I would like to reaffirm our readiness to continue our constructive joint work to further develop the entire range of bilateral ties, as well as cooperation in international affairs, including within the #BRICS framework.”

🔗 http://tiny.cc/ok8jvz

#Egypt

«Ёлка»/ Yolka

🎄Christmas tree is the main attribute of the New Year and Christmas celebration. In Russia, we call it “Yolka”. The tradition to decorate “yolka” can be traced to the 18th century when Peter the Great brought this tradition from the Western Europe to the Russian Empire. However, we started to decorate yolka with toys and lanterns only in the middle of 19th century . Before people used sweets and fruits to decorate Christmas trees. The Klin glass factory “Yolochka” was the first to produce Christmas tree ornament toys, becoming the oldest producer of such decorations in Russia. Nowadays there are various Christmas tree toys for every taste.
🎄However, yolka is not name only for Christmas trees in Russia. We also call New Year celebration for children “yolka”. It can be both live performance with Ded Moroz (Russian Santa Claus) or other fairy-tales characters as well as small family party to amuse the youngest members of the family. An important part of such celebration is a dance (“khorovod”) around the Christmas tree and sweet gifts.

🎙President Vladimir #Putin's remarks at an expanded meeting of the Defence Ministry Board (19 December 2023, Moscow)

Talking points:

🔹The #West continues to wage hybrid warfare against Russia.

🔹NATO has increased its overall activity dramatically of late. <...> Let me remind you of what we all know: in 1991, they promised Gorbachev: no, no, not an inch to the east – well, there you go. This is the kind of partners they are. They lie shamelessly, through their teeth.

🔹The West is not abandoning its strategy to contain Russia and its aggressive goals in #Ukraine. Well, we are not going to give up the goals of our special military operation either.

🔹All attempts, as they used to say in the West, to inflict a military defeat on us, a strategic defeat, were frustrated.

🔹We did everything to build relations, having gained a lot of patience for this. But no. Relying on these active and aggressive nationalist forces in Ukraine, the West simply did not leave us any chance for this.

Read in full👉 http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/73035

🎙 Statement by Minister of Defence of the Russian Federation General of the Army Sergei Shoigu at an expanded meeting of the Defence Ministry Board (December 19, 2023)

Talking points:

• Russian Groups of Forces have liberated an area five times larger than that of the Lugansk and Donetsk people's republics before the special military operation began.

💰 To date, Ukraine has received $203 billion from external sources, which is $30 billion more than its GDP. In fact, it is a bankrupt country. A significant part of these funds are loans that have to be repaid.

• In total, 5,220 tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, and armoured personnel carriers, 28 airplanes, 87 helicopters, 23,000 unmanned aerial vehicles, over 1,300 artillery systems, including 494 M777, Caesar, Paladin, and Krab howitzers, as well as 2,650,000 155-mm and 122-mm shells were delivered to Kiev.

• NATO military personnel have direct control over air defence systems, operational-tactical missiles, and multiple launch rocket systems. <...> A total of 410 military and dual-purpose spacecraft from NATO countries are working in the interests of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU).

❗️ Since the special operation began, the AFU's losses have exceeded 383,000 troops killed and wounded, 14,000 tanks, IFVs, and APCs, 553 airplanes and 259 helicopters, 8,500 field artillery guns and MLRS vehicles.

• The mercenaries who have been actively involved since the beginning of the special military operation have been eliminated for the most part. More than 5,800 militants were neutralised, including 1,427 from Poland, 466 from the US, and 344 from the UK.

☝️ Every day, more than 1,500 people [in Russia] apply for military service. This year alone, about 490,000 contract servicemen and volunteers have been recruited.

• The number of foreign volunteers willing to fight in favour of the truth has increased seven times. In the Ukrainian army, the opposite trend is observed. The number of foreign mercenaries has decreased six times.

🔗 https://t.me/mod_russia_en/11438

🏆The second Award Ceremony of the UNESCO-Russia Mendeleev International Prize was held on 13 December 2023 in Moscow at the headquarters of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

👨‍🔬👩‍🔬Established as a follow up of the International Year of the Periodic Table of Chemical Elements in 2019, the UNESCO-Russia Mendeleev International Prize in the Basic Sciences was created to foster scientific progress, science popularization and international cooperation in the basic sciences. It also commemorates the remarkable scientific heritage of D.I.Mendeleev, father of the Periodic Table, whose work played a fundamental role in the future of chemistry, physics, biology, astronomy and geochemistry.

☝️It is one of the most remarkable prizes in the UN system with an award of $500,000.

⚡️Based on the recommendations of an eminent international jury, it was decided to award the Prize to two outstanding chemists - 🇷🇺I.P.Beletskaya and 🇩🇪K.A. Müllen. Their achievements, continuing the work started by Mendeleev, demonstrate the invaluable importance of basic sciences for the development of international scientific cooperation.

👉More information about this award is available here: https://www.unesco.org/en/prizes/mendeleev

🗓 Established on December 19, 1961, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) is the leading humanitarian agency in its field, with a mission to fight hunger around the globe.

WFP focuses on delivering emergency assistance and facilitating recovery and development projects, while also undertaking special operations.

🇺🇳 The international community committed itself to eradicating hunger, achieving food security and improving nutrition by 2030.

🤝 Russia acts as one of the WFP’s key and largest donors, supporting its operations in many countries worldwide. Russia’s voluntary contributions to the WFP have exceeded $450 million. Russia and WFP have been consistent in their efforts to expand their ties in humanitarian affairs in hotspots, also by working on international humanitarian logistics and supporting WFP’s development projects.

🚚 Russia has also made a meaningful contribution to reinforcing the WFP’s logistics capabilities and upgrading its lorry fleet with Russian KAMAZ trucks. WFP received ~300 vehicles to carry out humanitarian shipments in hotspots across Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

As part of the WFP, Russia initiated the Debt-For-Development Initiative in Mozambique. The Governments agreed to convert Mozambique’s debt to Russia into funding to support the National School Feeding Programme. The largest innovative project of its kind, it was later replicated in other countries, including Madagascar and Tanzania.

School nutrition programmes are viewed as an effective format for delivering Russian aid through WFP. The biggest initiatives of this kind were carried out in Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan. There are also programmes for Nicaragua, Cuba, Syria and Jordan underway.

🇷🇺🤝🇺🇳 Russia appreciates the high level of interaction achieved with WFP and we hope to continue our constructive and mutually beneficial cooperation. We will continue providing humanitarian food assistance to the countries which need it the most.

Embassy Comment

In today’s issue of the Straits Times, we have read an article “A grim 2024 awaits Ukraine” by Mr. Jonathan Eyal, known for his shortsighted forecasts about what is happening in and around Russia.

In this case, however, we can agree with the title of the article, but we cannot agree with its content.

We will not dispute that the hybrid war against Russia unleashed by the West with the participation of its Ukrainian satellites is failing; the resources of the Ukrainian armed forces are gradually drying up, as is the enthusiasm of those who most zealously supported the Kiev neo-Nazis, both in Europe and overseas.

And this is not surprising in the context of the obvious collapse of the Kiev military on the battlefields, the reluctance of Ukrainians to fight (mobilization, as we know, is of a violent, coercive nature) and the complete absence of any reasonable, intelligible prospect for the Ukrainian authorities to lead the country out of the conflict that they themselves unleashed.

But what we cannot agree with, is the author’s attempts to place part of the historical responsibility for the tragedy of Ukraine on Russia, with an attempt to put us on the same level as the aggressor, accusing us of invading Ukraine and attributing to us some fictitious plans for an a-la blitzkrieg victory marches through its territory.

We have to disappoint the author. Russia has never been either an occupier or an aggressor in Ukraine. Quite the contrary, it was Russia’s citizens who became victims of Ukrainian extremists and in order to survive, they decided to secede from Ukraine and become part of the Russian Federation represented by the Lugansk and Donetsk People's Republics, Zaporozhye and Kherson regions. In the name of the lives and salvation of these citizens, a special military operation (SMO) was launched, with the goal of demilitarization, denazification and ensuring the non-bloc status of Ukraine. Contrary to Mr. Eyal’s assertion, the SMO is developing successfully, in accordance with its strategic plan. Its goals will be achieved in full, victory will be ours. Why? Because the Russian people decided so, fully supporting the decision of their President and the operations of their armed forces.

Perhaps this unshakable unity of the Russian society, which our enemies sought to undermine, is the root of the hesitation of Western politicians and their Ukrainian henchmen, who do not dare to take the simple step of laying down their arms and sitting down at the negotiating table.

Well, let them hesitate, let them guess with the tea leaves together with the author of the article, let them think up scenarios for the development of events. In our opinion, they have no other way than to admit their historical defeat.

🗓 Established on December 19, 1961, the UN World Food Programme (WFP) is the leading humanitarian agency in its field, with a mission to fight hunger around the globe.

WFP focuses on delivering emergency assistance and facilitating recovery and development projects, while also undertaking special operations.

🇺🇳 The international community committed itself to eradicating hunger, achieving food security and improving nutrition by 2030.

🤝 Russia acts as one of the WFP’s key and largest donors, supporting its operations in many countries worldwide. Russia’s voluntary contributions to the WFP have exceeded $450 million. Russia and WFP have been consistent in their efforts to expand their ties in humanitarian affairs in hotspots, also by working on international humanitarian logistics and supporting WFP’s development projects.

🚚 Russia has also made a meaningful contribution to reinforcing the WFP’s logistics capabilities and upgrading its lorry fleet with Russian KAMAZ trucks. WFP received ~300 vehicles to carry out humanitarian shipments in hotspots across Asia, the Middle East and Africa.

As part of the WFP, Russia initiated the Debt-For-Development Initiative in Mozambique. The Governments agreed to convert Mozambique’s debt to Russia into funding to support the National School Feeding Programme. The largest innovative project of its kind, it was later replicated in other countries, including Madagascar and Tanzania.

School nutrition programmes are viewed as an effective format for delivering Russian aid through WFP. The biggest initiatives of this kind were carried out in Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan. There are also programmes for Nicaragua, Cuba, Syria and Jordan underway.

🇷🇺🤝🇺🇳 Russia appreciates the high level of interaction achieved with WFP and we hope to continue our constructive and mutually beneficial cooperation. We will continue providing humanitarian food assistance to the countries which need it the most.

🎙 Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s interview with Channel One’s Bolshaya Igra (Great Game) political talk show (Moscow, December 18, 2023)

📰 Read in full
📺 Watch

Key talking points:

▫️ We are well aware of the fact (as we made it clear many years ago) that all of this is not about Ukraine but about containing Russia. Kiev was used as a tool to pose permanent military threats to the Russian Federation and to eradicate our influence to the extent of destroying Russian traditions, language, culture, and even ethnic Russians physically.

▫️ Every day we hear assertions (repeated by several Western countries) that the Americans are not taking part in the hostilities but are only “supporting” Ukraine, which is waging a “just” war for its sovereignty, territorial integrity and European values. There are many facts, including on video, about mercenaries from Poland and other European states. Some are even from the Middle East where the Americans still have the Al-Tanf military base in Syria, where ISIS commandos feel at ease. Some of them have been seen in Ukraine.

▫️ The new version of Russia’s Foreign Policy Concept uses a novel term describing Russia as a state and a civilisation at one and the same time. This involves much responsibility. The concept states the objective fact that Russia is a civilisation in its own right

▫️ We have no territorial disputes with NATO countries. In general, we no longer have any territorial disputes with anyone. Territorial disputes even with Japan have been settled. They understand this perfectly well.

▫️ Again, to put this in perspective: Europe, and the US are leaving no stone unturned in the Middle East as they urge the Lebanese, Iranians, Iraqis, and Syrians to do their best to prevent the war in Gaza from spreading to contiguous territories. Perhaps, they should act with the same amount of zeal to prevent this from happening in Ukraine.

🎙 Comment by Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova on the defence cooperation agreement between Finland and the US

💬 The government of Finland has recently approved the signing of a defence cooperation agreement with the US. The document will come into force after its ratification by the country’s parliament.

📄 The agreement regulates:

• the quantities involved;
• issues related to transporting and deploying US troops;
• their use of military bases;
• storing weapons on the Finnish territory.

❗️ It is worth noting that the agreement’s provisions do not contain any restrictions on the types of weapons, including nuclear weapons, to be used to implement the treaty, and also de facto place the American military contingent in Finland beyond the reach of the Finnish legal system.

In this regard, on December 19, the Finnish Ambassador in Moscow was summoned to the Foreign Ministry and notified that the Russian Party will not leave unanswered the boosting of NATO military capabilities on our border that threatens the Russian Federation’s security and will take necessary measures to counteract the aggressive decisions of Finland and its NATO allies.

The responsibility for turning a zone of neighbourliness in the region into a zone of possible confrontation will fall entirely on the current Finnish authorities.