Western sanctions are short-sighted and pose a danger to the entire world, which is increasingly turning to Asia, Russian President Vladimir Putin said today in a speech at the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, a city in the Russian Far East. .
As Putin said, the West has undermined the global economy with an "aggressive" attempt to impose its dominance around the world, but the Asia-Pacific region is on the rise.
"Irreversible, even tectonic changes have taken place in international relations. The role of dynamic, promising countries and regions of the world – especially the Asia-Pacific region, has increased significantly.”
Putin said sanctions have replaced the coronavirus pandemic as the main threat to the global economy.
"I am referring to the West's fever of sanctions with its shameful, aggressive attempt to impose models of behavior on other countries, to deprive them of their national sovereignty and to undermine their wishes," he said.
"This is not unprecedented. This is the policy the West has collectively followed for decades. Western countries are struggling to maintain a bygone world order that only favors them, to force everyone to live by the miserable rules they themselves invented and are systematically breaking, rules that are constantly changing to their advantage depending on the current conditions," Putin said.
The Russian economy, however, is coping with the economic and technological aggression of the West, as Putin described it, acknowledging that there are some difficulties in some industries and regions.
Among the affected industries are, according to him, those dependent on supplies from Europe.
It is "impossible," as Putin said, to isolate Russia, and Moscow will defy Western efforts to oust it from the world stage.
Russia sees more opportunities to enter the Middle East and Iranian markets after the imposition of tough Western sanctions in response to Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the Russian president said, noting that Moscow has done everything to ensure that the Kyiv will be able to export grain.
Problems in the global food market are likely to increase and there is a risk of a humanitarian disaster, he added.
Russia has lost nothing because of the military operation, as it calls it, that it is conducting in Ukraine, the Russian president commented.
All of Moscow's actions are designed to strengthen Russian national sovereignty and are aimed at "helping the citizens" living in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine.
Source: RES-EAP