Interfax: Russian calls not to impose values on others ignored by West – Putin

(Interfax – December 20, 2015)

Moscow, 20 December: Russian President Vladimir Putin has said that he has always warned Western partners against “automatically, mechanically” spreading their ideas about democracy to other countries and nations.

“I have spoken to many leaders, both European and American, over many years. And when it came to various operations, in Afghanistan, or in Iraq, or later in Libya, my position always was that they should tread carefully and should not apply their own schemes and notions of good and evil, in this case about good, about democracy, automatically, simply mechanically, to other countries and nations with a different culture, religion and traditions,” the president said in an interview on the TV channel Rossiya 1 (VGTRK) documentary “World Order”.

Nobody, however, heeded these appeals, Putin said.

“Why? Because, apparently, they consider themselves to be infallible, to be great, yet there is zero responsibility,” Putin said.

The head of state recalled the Yalta Conference, which fixed the balance of forces in 1945. Back then, the victor nations, Putin recalled, built a system “consistent with the alignment of political forces”.

“Since then, much has changed, there are now nuclear weapons, which is a significant factor in world affairs, it has spread to several other countries, global giants have grown up, such as India, China, and the Soviet Union left the political stage. And so the bipolar system went pop,” Putin said.

“That is, our partners ought to have thought about how to take advantage of this situation and become moral leaders in the world affairs the way they are shaping up. But they continued to act and think the old way, and the Cold War cliches remained in their heads,” Putin added.

[featured image is file photo]