Putin says West doesn’t need big Russia

TEHRAN, (MNA) – Russian President Vladimir Putin said the West doesn’t need a large Russia.

"In principle, the West does not need such a large and multinational country as Russia," he said in a speech to the Worldwide Russian People's Assembly via video link. "Our diversity and unity of cultures, traditions, languages, ethnicities simply does not fit into the logic of Western racists and colonizers, into their cruel scheme of total depersonalization, disunity, suppression, and exploitation."

"So they are reusing the same old narrative again: Russia is a prison of nations, and Russians themselves are a nation of slaves. We have heard this many times over the centuries. We have also heard that Russia, it turns out, now needs to be decolonized," the president said. "In reality, what do they want? In fact, they want to break up and plunder Russia. If they can’t pull this off by force, then they will try to sow discord."

"We regard any foreign interference and provocations aimed at causing interethnic or interreligious conflicts as aggressive actions against our country and as an attempt to challenge Russia with terrorism and extremism as a tool of fighting us," Putin said. "We will respond proportionately."

The president blamed Western elites for making Russophobia and neo-Nazism their official ideology.

"Today, Russophobia, other forms of racism and neo-Nazism have practically become the official ideology of Western ruling elites," TASS quoted him as saying.