Vladimir Putin: State

“You don't understand, George, that Ukraine is not even a state. What is Ukraine? Part of its territories is Eastern Europe, but the greater part is a gift from us.”

Vladimir Putin

Ты же понимаешь, Джордж, что Украина — это даже не государство! Что такое Украина? Часть ее территорий — это Восточная Европа, а часть, и значительная, подарена нами!
According to the same source, “and then he very transparently hinted that if Ukraine was still admitted to NATO, this state would simply cease to exist, that is, in fact, he threatened that Russia could start the rejection of the Crimea and Eastern Ukraine.” (И тут он очень прозрачно намекнул, что если Украину все же примут в НАТО, это государство просто прекратит существование. То есть фактически он пригрозил, что Россия может начать отторжение Крыма и Восточной Украины.)
Speaking to George H. Bush at the NATO Bucharest Summit, April 4, 2008. http://content.time.com/time/world/article/0,8599,1900838,00.html Originally reported in Kommersant.ru based on an unidentified source http://www.kommersant.ru/doc/877224.
On Ukraine

Understanding , Parting

“Speaking of the sanctions, they are not just a knee-jerk reaction on behalf of the United States or its allies to our position regarding the events and the coup in Ukraine, or even the so-called Crimean Spring. I’m sure that if these events had never happened – I want to point this out specifically for you as politicians sitting in this auditorium – if none of that had ever happened, they would have come up with some other excuse to try to contain Russia’s growing capabilities, affect our country in some way, or even take advantage of it. 4 December 2014, The Kremlin Moscow, http://eng.news.kremlin.ru/news/23341”

Vladimir Putin

On Ukraine

Jerk , Way , Spring , Country

“If minorities prefer Sharia Law, then we advise them to go to those places where that’s the state law… We will not grant them special privileges, or try to change our laws to fit their desires, no matter how loud they yell ‘discrimination.”

Vladimir Putin

Huffington Post, https://www.huffingtonpost.com/arnold-steinberg/the-un-speech-president-o_b_8216286.html (30 September 2016)
2016 - 2018

Law , Change

“Ukraine is an independent, sovereign state and will choose its own path to peace and security.. . . Such a conversation would be entirely appropriate and entirely possible. I certainly don’t see there being anything particularly tricky here, anything that need or that could cast a shadow over relations between Russia and Ukraine.”

Vladimir Putin

About Ukraine seeking membership in Nato, after the Nato–Russia Council was created at the Nato summit in Rome, May 28, 2002. http://www.usubc.org/keyissues/russia_reset040109.php
On Ukraine

Peace

“At least the state figure should have a head.”

Vladimir Putin

In response to Hillary Clinton's comment that Putin has 'no soul'. http://ria.ru/politics/20080507/106744531.html
2006- 2010

“I think there are things of which I and the people who have worked with me can feel deservedly proud. They include restoring Russia's territorial integrity, strengthening the state, progress towards establishing a multiparty system, strengthening the parliamentary system, restoring the Armed Forces' potential and, of course, developing the economy. As you know, our economy has been growing by 6.9 percent a year on average over this time, and our GDP has increased by 7.7 percent over the first four months of this year alone.
When I began my work in the year 2000, 30 percent of our population was living below the poverty line. There has been a two-fold drop in the number of people living below the poverty line since then and the figure today is around 15 percent. By 2009-2010, we will bring this figure down to 10 percent, and this will bring us in line with the European average.
We had enormous debts, simply catastrophic for our economy, but we have paid them off in full now. Not only have we paid our debts, but we now have the best foreign debt to GDP ratio in Europe. Our gold and currency reserve figures are well known: in 2000, they stood at just $12 billion and we had a debt of more than 100 percent of GDP, but now we have the third-biggest gold and currency reserves in the world and they have increased by $90 billion over the first four months of this year alone.
During the 1990s and even in 2000-2001, we had massive capital flight from Russia with $15 billion, $20 billion or $25 billion leaving the country every year. Last year we reversed this situation for the first time and had capital inflow of $41 billion. We have already had capital inflow of $40 billion over the first four months of this year. Russia's stock market capitalisation showed immense growth last year and increased by more than 50 percent. This is one of the best results in the world, perhaps even the best. Our economy was near the bottom of the list of world economies in terms of size but today it has climbed to ninth place and in some areas has even overtaken some of the other G8 countries' economies. This means that today we are able to tackle social problems. Real incomes are growing by around 12 percent a year. Real income growth over the first four months of this year came to just over 18 percent, while wages rose by 11-12 percent.
Looking at the problems we have yet to resolve, one of the biggest is the huge income gap between the people at the top and the bottom of the scale. Combating poverty is obviously one of our top priorities in the immediate term and we still have to do a lot to improve our pension system too because the correlation between pensions and the average wage is still lower here than in Europe. The gap between incomes at the top and bottom end of the scale is still high here – a 15.6-15.7-fold difference. This is less than in the United States today (they have a figure of 15.9) but more than in the UK or Italy (where they have 13.6-13.7). But this remains a big gap for us and fighting poverty is one of our biggest priorities.”

Vladimir Putin

When asked in June 2007 at the interview with G8 journalists about main achievements of his presidency http://web.archive.org/web/20070607221025/http://www.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2007/06/04/2149_type82916_132772.shtml.

People , World , Feeling , Problem

“They act as they please: here and there, they use force against sovereign states, building coalitions based on the principle 'If you are not with us, you are against us.' To make this aggression look legitimate, they force the necessary resolutions from international organizations, and if for some reason this does not work, they simply ignore the UN Security Council and the UN overall.”

Vladimir Putin

Crimea address (18 March 2014) http://rt.com/news/putin-address-ten-quotes-778/
2011 - 2015

“Sometimes you don't know what is better: to talk with the governments of some States or directly with their American patrons and sponsors.”

Vladimir Putin

6 December 2014, Владимир Путин @ facebook. com

“The U. S. is a very democratic state. There's no doubt about that. And it originally developed as a democratic state. When the first settlers set their foot on the continent, life forced them to forge a relationship and maintain a dialogue with each other to survive. That's why America was conceived as a fundamental democracy.”

Vladimir Putin

Interview http://web.archive.org/web/20130614041959/http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=33oIF-ggK5U (2013).
2011 - 2015

Life , Democracy

“As for some countries’ concerns about Russia's possible aggressive actions, I think that only an insane person and only in a dream can imagine that Russia would suddenly attack NATO. I think some countries are simply taking advantage of people’s fears with regard to Russia. They just want to play the role of front-line countries that should receive some supplementary military, economic, financial or some other aid. Therefore, it is pointless to support this idea; it is absolutely groundless. But some may be interested in fostering such fears. I can only make a conjecture.

For example, the Americans do not want Russia's rapprochement with Europe. I am not asserting this, it is just a hypothesis. Let’s suppose that the United States would like to maintain its leadership in the Atlantic community. It needs an external threat, an external enemy to ensure this leadership. Iran is clearly not enough – this threat is not very scary or big enough. Who can be frightening? And then suddenly this crisis unfolds in Ukraine. Russia is forced to respond. Perhaps, it was engineered on purpose, I don’t know. But it was not our doing.

Let me tell you something – there is no need to fear Russia. The world has changed so drastically that people with some common sense cannot even imagine such a large-scale military conflict today. We have other things to think about, I assure you.”

Vladimir Putin

2015-06-06, Interview to the Italian newspaper Il Corriere della Sera. http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/49629
2011 - 2015

People , World , Fear , Dreams

“People in Russia say that those who do not regret the collapse of the Soviet Union have no heart, and those that do regret it have no brain. We do not regret this, we simply state the fact and know that we need to look ahead, not backwards. We will not allow the past to drag us down and stop us from moving ahead. We understand where we should move. But we must act based on a clear understanding of what happened..”

Vladimir Putin

Interview with German television channel ARD and ZDF, May 2005. Kremlin, RU, http://archive.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2005/05/05/2355_type82912type82916_87597.shtml (May 2005)
2000 - 2005

People , Understanding , Past , Heart

“I realise that 2008 will be an important test for Russia, and not an easy one. At the same time, the Constitution of the Russian Federation states that the President, the head of state, is elected for four years through direct secret ballot and cannot stay in office for more than two consecutive terms.
I am not indifferent of course to the question of who will take in their hands the destiny of the country I have devoted my life to serving. But if each successive head of state were to change the Constitution to suit them, we would soon find ourselves without a state at all. I think that Russia's different political forces are sufficiently mature to realise their responsibility to the people of the Russian Federation. In any case, the person who receives the votes of the majority of Russian citizens will become the President of the country.”

Vladimir Putin

Answering the question of Dutch TV station "Nederland 1" and Dutch newspaper "NRC Handelsblad", "Can you imagine a situation in which you would decide to remain in office for a third term?", Putin said: http://web.archive.org/web/20061013003243/http://www.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2005/10/31/1955_type82914type82916_96455.shtml
2006- 2010

Life , People , Secret , Question

“They do not represent the interests of the Russian state
Maybe they’re not even Russians,
Maybe they’re Ukrainians, Tatars, Jews, just with Russian citizenship, even that needs to be checked.”

Vladimir Putin

The Jerusalem Post http://www.jpost.com/printarticle.aspx?id=544708 (10 March 2018)
2016 - 2018

“We are improving our attack systems as an answer to the United States building its missile defense system… Clearly, we have overtaken all our, so to speak, partners and competitors in this sphere, and this fact is acknowledged by the experts. No one has a high-precision hypersonic weapon…So, we feel confident in this sense.”

Vladimir Putin

Cooperation, Terrorism, UK & USA, President Trump, Resolving Conflict, Defense, Crimea, The Media, Nuclear Weapons Policy: 15th Plenary Session (18 October 2018)

Sense , Self-confidence , Confidence , Feeling

“For some years before us, countries that agreed to participate in these anti-terrorist operations, most often voluntarily, and maybe even with less than perfect goals and objectives – what result have we seen in the previous three years? None. While we have liberated almost 95 percent of the entire territory of the Syrian Republic. This is my first point. Second. We supported Syria’s statehood, prevented the state from collapsing. True, there are still many problems.”

Vladimir Putin

Cooperation, Terrorism, UK & USA, President Trump, Resolving Conflict, Defense, Crimea, The Media, Nuclear Weapons Policy: 15th Plenary Session (18 October 2018)

Perfection , Support , Problem , Country

“As to Russia, we spoke about it a number of times and we reaffirmed that at the forum again and also agreed on that in the final document. We are going to fully comply with our commitments. In the nearest future we will begin the ratification of these agreements and will conduct the necessary domestic procedures. These issues are highly relevant for us.I stated this at the last plenary session. Let me remind you that according to the Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring, the warming in Russia is happening 2.5 times faster than the average global warming. This is a major challenge for us. We must realise that. This is the reason for floods, and for permafrost thawing in the areas where we have fairly big cities. We must be able to understand how to react to the climate changes underway there.”

Vladimir Putin

Vladimir Putin’s news conference, Transcript, Kremlin.ru, http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/transcripts/60857 (29 June 2019)
2019

Future , Time , Understanding , Change

“Positions have been coordinated, except for the United States, which always has a special opinion. In fact, the US delegation was open about it from the outset. Everyone knows the current Administration’s stance on the Paris Accords. Nevertheless, all the other participants in the forum confirmed their readiness to implement the agreements under the Paris Accords. Actually, I think there is also a positive moment in the US position too, since the Americans said they were ready to work on the environmental agenda under their own programme. We have to read the final wording but the fact that the Americans say they also want to contribute to solving environmental issues is a positive thing, in my view.”

Vladimir Putin

Vladimir Putin’s news conference, Transcript, Kremlin.ru, http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/transcripts/60857 (29 June 2019)
2019

Thinking , Reading