Russian President Putin delivers annual state of the nation address

World Today

The Russian President delivered his annual state of the nation address on Thursday. It was mainly devoted to domestic issues but Vladimir Putin also talked about Russia’s role in international politics and provided an insight into his country’s geopolitical strategy.

CCTV’s Julia Lyubova reports the story.
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Putin said Russia is willing to reconcile its relations with the United States and is ready to cooperate with president-elect Donald Trump. In his annual state of the nation address, Putin refrained from his usual criticism of Washington and outlined his vision for U.S./Russian ties.

“We are ready for cooperation with the new U.S. administration. It is important to normalize and start developing bilateral relations on equal and mutually beneficial grounds,” Putin said.

Putin said that Russia’s ‘pivot to Asia’ is in the country’s national interests and is a long-term strategy. He spoke of intentions to build ties with China, Japan and other South Asian nations.

“Russia-China strategic partnership has become one of the key factors in ensuring global and regional stability. It serves as a model of international relations,” said Putin.

According to the Russian President, this model of relations is not based on the idea of one country’s domination, but on an all-encompassing respect for the interests of all states.

“President Putin emphasized that Russia’s pivot to Asia by no means should be understood as a substitute to Russia’s policy to the West. The very geography of Russia, the historical mission of Russia, makes it the biggest Eurasian power which can serve as a bridge between rapidly developing Asia-Pacific region and Europe,” Sergey Strokan, a political analyst said.

In previous years, Putin has used his state of the nation speech to lash out at the West, the U.S. and other countries that fell foul of the Kremlin.

But this year, the message was more conciliatory, with Vladimir Putin saying that Moscow is ready to cooperate with the new U.S. administration and is willing to make friends, not enemies.


Vladmir Glostein on Russia state of the nation

For more on Russia’s state of the nation address, CCTV America’s Elaine Reyes spoke with Vladmir Golstein, an associate professor of Slavic Studies at Brown University.