Foreign policy of Vladimir Putin#Military build-up around Ukraine

File:Bush&Putin33rdG8.jpg and Putin at the 33rd G8 summit, June 2007]]

{{see also|Russia–NATO relations|Russia–United States relations|Russia–United Kingdom relations}}

After the 11 September attacks, Putin supported the U.S. in the War on Terror, thus creating an opportunity for deepening the relationship with the leading Western and NATO power.[https://www.huffingtonpost.com/stephen-f-cohen/us-russia-policy_b_1307727.html America's Failed (Bi-Partisan) Russia Policy] by Stephen F. Cohen, Huffington Post On 13 December 2001, Bush gave Russia notice of the United States' unilateral withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty.{{Cite web|url=https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2002-01/us-withdrawal-abm-treaty-president-bush%E2%80%99s-remarks-us-diplomatic-notes|title=U.S. Withdrawal From the ABM Treaty: President Bush's Remarks and U.S. Diplomatic Notes | Arms Control Association|website=www.armscontrol.org}} From Russia's point of view, the US withdrawal from the agreement, which ensured strategic parity between the parties, destroyed hopes for a new partnership.{{Cite news|url=https://www.letemps.ch/opinions/vladimir-poutine-quart-dheure-gloire|title=Vladimir Poutine et son quart d'heure de gloire|newspaper=Le Temps |date=4 November 2013|via=www.letemps.ch}} Russia opposed the expansion of NATO which happened at the 2002 Prague summit.

Since 2003, when Russia did not support the Iraq War and when Putin became ever more distant from the West in his internal and external policies, the relations remained strained. In an interview with Michael Stürmer, Putin was quoted saying that there were three questions which most concerned Russia and Eastern Europe; namely the status of Kosovo, the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe, and American plans to build missile defence sites in Poland and the Czech Republic, and suggested that all three were some way linked.{{cite book|last=Stuermer|first=Michael|author-link=Michael Stürmer|title=Putin and the Rise of Russia|year=2008|publisher=Weidenfeld & Nicolson|location=London|isbn=978-0-297-85510-1|url=https://archive.org/details/putinriseofrussi0000stue_z7s1|url-access=registration|access-date=11 June 2012|pages=[https://archive.org/details/putinriseofrussi0000stue_z7s1/page/55 55], 57 & 192}} In Putin's view, concessions on one of these questions on the Western side might be met with concessions from Russia on another.

File:Vladimir Putin 28 May 2002-17.jpg at the Russia-NATO Summit in Rome, Italy on 28 May 2002]]

In February 2007, at the annual Munich Conference on Security Policy, Putin openly criticised what he called the United States' monopolistic dominance in global relations, and "almost uncontained hyper use of force in international relations".43rd Munich Conference on Security Policy. [http://president.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2007/02/10/0138_type82912type82914type82917type84779_118123.shtml Putin's speech in English] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080504052149/http://president.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2007/02/10/0138_type82912type82914type82917type84779_118123.shtml |date=2008-05-04 }}, 10 February 2007. In this speech, which became known as Munich Speech, Putin called for a "fair and democratic world order that would ensure security and prosperity not only for a select few, but for all". His remarks however were met with criticism by some delegates{{cite news|title=Russia: Washington Reacts To Putin's Munich Speech|url=http://www.rferl.org/content/article/1074671.html|newspaper=RFERL}} such as former NATO secretary Jaap de Hoop Scheffer who called his speech, "disappointing and not helpful."{{cite news|title=Putin's speech: Back to cold war? Putin's speech: Back to cold war?|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/6350847.stm|newspaper=BBC | first=Rob|last=Watson|date=10 February 2007}}

The months following Putin's Munich speech were marked by tension and a surge in rhetoric on both sides of the Atlantic. Both Russian and American officials, however, denied the idea of a new Cold War.{{cite web|url=http://www.defenselink.mil/speeches/speech.aspx?speechid=1123|title=United States Department of Defense|website=www.defenselink.mil|access-date=27 September 2017}} Then US Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said on the Munich Conference: "We all face many common problems and challenges that must be addressed in partnership with other countries, including Russia. ... One Cold War was quite enough."

{{ Cite web

| url = http://www.defenselink.mil/speeches/speech.aspx?speechid=1123

| title = Munich Conference on Security Policy: As Delivered by Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates, Munich, Germany, Sunday, February 11, 2007

| publisher = United States Department of Defense

| date = 2007-02-11

| access-date = 2010-08-02

}} Vladimir Putin said prior to 33rd G8 Summit, on 4 June 2007: "we do not want confrontation; we want to engage in dialogue. However, we want a dialogue that acknowledges the equality of both parties' interests."

{{ Cite web

|url = http://www.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2007/06/04/2149_type82916_132716.shtml

|title = Interview with Newspaper Journalists from G8 Member Countries

|publisher = Presidential Administration of Russia

|date = 2007-06-04

|access-date = 2010-08-02

|archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20080504052139/http://www.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2007/06/04/2149_type82916_132716.shtml

|archive-date = 2008-05-04

}}

In June 2007, when answering a question about whether Russian nuclear forces might be focused on European targets in case "the United States continued building a strategic shield in Poland and the Czech Republic", Putin admitted: "if part of the United States' nuclear capability is situated in Europe and that our military experts consider that they represent a potential threat, then we will have to take appropriate retaliatory steps. What steps? Of course we must have new targets in Europe."Doug Sanders, [https://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20070602.wputin01/BNStory/International/home "Putin threatens to target Europe with missiles"] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20081231091845/http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20070602.wputin01/BNStory/International/home |date=2008-12-31 }}, The Globe and Mail, 2 June 2007

File:Vladimir Putin in Italy 17-18 April 2008-4.jpg Silvio Berlusconi, in 2008]]

Putin continued his public opposition of a U.S. missile shield in Europe, and presented President George W. Bush with a counterproposal on 7 June 2007 of sharing the use of the Soviet-era radar system in Azerbaijan rather than building a new system in the Czech Republic. Putin expressed readiness to modernise the Gabala Radar Station, which has been in operation since 1986. Putin proposed it would not be necessary to place interceptor missiles in Poland then, but interceptors could be placed in Iraq or NATO member Turkey. Putin suggested also equal involvement of interested European countries in the project.[http://www.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2007/06/08/2251_type82914type82915_133552.shtml Press Conference following the end of the G8 Summit] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080504052143/http://www.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2007/06/08/2251_type82914type82915_133552.shtml |date=2008-05-04 }}, 8 June 2007

In his annual address to the Federal Assembly on 26 April 2007, Putin announced plans to declare a moratorium on the observance of the CFE Treaty by Russia until all NATO members ratified it and started observing its provisions, as Russia had been doing on a unilateral basis. Putin argues that as new NATO members have not even signed the treaty so far, an imbalance in the presence of NATO and Russian armed forces in Europe creates a real threat and an unpredictable situation for Russia.[http://www.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2007/04/26/1209_type70029type82912_125670.shtml Annual Address to the Federal Assembly] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080504052130/http://www.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2007/04/26/1209_type70029type82912_125670.shtml |date=2008-05-04 }}, 26 April 2007, Kremlin, Moscow NATO members said they would refuse to ratify the treaty until Russia complied with its 1999 commitments made in Istanbul whereby Russia should remove troops and military equipment from Moldova and Georgia. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov was quoted as saying in response that "Russia has long since fulfilled all its Istanbul obligations relevant to CFE".[http://www.izvestia.ru/news/news156321 Lavrov Announced Conditions of Resuming CFE Observance] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080405032637/http://www.izvestia.ru/news/news156321 |date=2008-04-05 }}, 3 December 2007, Izvestia.ru

Russia suspended its participation in the CFE as of midnight Moscow time on 11 December 2007.{{cite web|title=Russia walks away from CFE arms treaty |publisher=AFP via Yahoo! News |date=December 12, 2007 |url=https://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20071212/ts_afp/russiausnatomilitarycfe_071212075936 |access-date=2007-12-13 }}{{dead link|date=May 2016|bot=medic}}{{cbignore|bot=medic}}{{cite web

| title = Russia Suspends Participation In CFE Treaty

| publisher = Radio Liberty

| date= December 12, 2007

| url = http://www.rferl.org/featuresarticle/2007/12/b1d3648d-7728-4fbb-8c52-0d2d2ee65453.html

| access-date = 2007-12-13}} On 12 December 2007, the United States officially said it "deeply regretted the Russian Federation's decision to 'suspend' implementation of its obligations under the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE)." State Department spokesman Sean McCormack, in a written statement, added that "Russia's conventional forces are the largest on the European continent, and its unilateral action damages this successful arms control regime."{{cite web

| title = US 'deeply regrets' Russia's 'wrong' decision on CFE

| publisher = AFP

| date= December 12, 2007

| url = http://www.spacewar.com/reports/US_deeply_regrets_Russias_wrong_decision_on_CFE_999.html

| access-date = 2007-12-13}} NATO's primary concern arising from Russia's suspension is that Moscow could now accelerate its military presence in the Northern Caucasus.{{cite news

| title = Putin poised to freeze arms pact as assertiveness grows

| newspaper = Financial Times

| date= December 12, 2007

| url = http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/bf64d30e-a855-11dc-9485-0000779fd2ac.html

| access-date = 2007-12-13}}

Putin strongly opposed the secession of Kosovo from Serbia. He called any support for this act "immoral" and "illegal".{{cite news|url=http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-02/14/content_7604675.htm|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080217221925/http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008-02/14/content_7604675.htm|archive-date=17 February 2008|title=Putin: supports for Kosovo unilateral independence "immoral, illegal"|agency=Xinhua News Agency|date=14 February 2008|access-date=2008-02-25}} He described the 2008 Kosovo declaration of independence a "terrible precedent" that will come back to hit the West "in the face".{{cite web |url=https://www.smh.com.au/world/putin-calls-kosovo-independence-terrible-precedent-20080223-gds2d5.html |title=Putin calls Kosovo independence 'terrible precedent' |date=February 23, 2008 |website=The Sydney Morning Herald |publisher= |access-date=July 5, 2021 |quote=}} He stated that the Kosovo precedent will de facto destroy the whole system of international relations, developed over centuries.{{cite web|url=http://www2.irna.ir/en/news/view/menu-239/0802233413164912.htm |title=EU's Solana rejects Putin's criticism over Kosovo's independence |publisher=IRNA |date=23 February 2008 |access-date=2008-02-25 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080226194531/http://www2.irna.ir/en/news/view/menu-239/0802233413164912.htm |archive-date=2008-02-26 }}

Putin's relations with former British Prime Minister Tony Blair, former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, former French Presidents Jacques Chirac, and Nicolas Sarkozy and Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi were reported to be personally friendly. Putin's "cooler" and "more business-like" relationship with Germany's subsequent Chancellor, Angela Merkel is often attributed to Merkel's upbringing in the former DDR, where Putin was stationed when he was a KGB agent.{{cite news|last=Simpson |first=Emma |url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4618860.stm |title=Merkel cools Berlin Moscow ties |work=BBC News |date=2006-01-16 |access-date=2013-06-22}}

File:Vladimir Putin 13 June 2005-1.jpg and British Prime Minister Tony Blair in 2005]]

By mid-2000s (decade), the relations between Russia and the United Kingdom deteriorated when the United Kingdom granted political asylum to, oligarch Boris Berezovsky, in 2003. Berezovsky, located in London, often criticised Putin. The United Kingdom also granted asylum to the Chechen rebel leader Akhmed Zakayev and other notable persons who had fled Russia.

In 2006, President Putin introduced a law which restricted non-governmental organisations (NGOs) from getting funding from foreign governments. This resulted in many NGOs closing.{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-16614209|title=UK spied on Russia with fake rock|work=BBC News|date=27 September 2017|access-date=27 September 2017}}

The end of 2006 brought strained relations between Russia and Britain in the wake of the death of Alexander Litvinenko in London by poisoning with polonium-210. On 20 July 2007, the Gordon Brown government expelled "four Russian envoys over Putin's refusal to extradite ex-KGB agent Andrei Lugovoi, wanted in the UK for the murder of fellow former spy Alexander Litvinenko in London."{{cite news|title=Brown Defends Russian Expulsions, Decries Killings|author=Gonzalo Vina and Sebastian Alison|url=https://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601102&sid=ajvS9NfMW2EE&refer=uk|publisher=Bloomberg News|date=July 20, 2007}} The Russian government, among other things, said it would suspend issuing visas to UK officials and froze cooperation on counterterrorism in response to Britain suspending contacts with their Federal Security Service.

Alexander Shokhin, president of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs warned that British investors in Russia will "face greater scrutiny from tax and regulatory authorities. [And] They could also lose out in government tenders". On 11 December 2007, Russia ordered the British Council to halt work at its regional offices in what was seen as the latest round of a dispute over the murder of Alexander Litvinenko; Britain said Russia's move was illegal.{{cite news

| title = Russia suspends British Council regional offices

| work = Reuters

| date= December 10, 2007

| url = https://www.reuters.com/article/worldNews/idUSL1288433020071212?feedType=RSS&feedName=worldNews&rpc=22&sp=true

| access-date = 2007-12-12}}

File:33rdG8Leaders.jpg

On 1 April 2014, NATO decided to suspend practical co-operation with Russia, in response to the Annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation.{{cite news

| author =

| title = Ukraine crisis: Nato suspends Russia co-operation

| url = https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-26838894

| newspaper = BBC News

| location = Russia

| date = 2014-04-02

| access-date = 2014-04-02

}}

Putin has denounced the idea of "American exceptionalism".{{cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/12/opinion/putin-plea-for-caution-from-russia-on-syria.html|title=Opinion - What Putin Has to Say to Americans About Syria|first=Vladimir V.|last=Putin|newspaper=The New York Times|date=11 September 2013|access-date=27 September 2017}} Putin has brought up police behavior in Ferguson in response to criticisms of democracy in Russia.{{cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2015/09/28/live-from-new-york-its-putin-speech-bingo/|title=Live from New York: It's Putin Speech Bingo|first=Andrew|last=Roth|date=28 September 2015|access-date=27 September 2017|newspaper=The Washington Post}}

A report released in November 2014 highlighted the fact that close military encounters between Russia and the West (mainly NATO countries) had jumped to Cold War levels, with 40 dangerous or sensitive incidents recorded in the eight months alone, including a near-collision between a Russian reconnaissance plane and a Scandinavian Airlines passenger plane taking off from Denmark in March 2014 with 132 passengers on board.{{cite news |author=Ewen MacAskill |title=Close military encounters between Russia and the west 'at cold war levels' |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/nov/10/close-military-encounters-russia-west-cold-war |newspaper=The Guardian |location=UK |date=2014-11-09 |access-date=2014-12-28}} The 2014 unprecedented increase{{cite news |title=Russia Baltic military actions 'unprecedented' - Poland |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-30429349 |newspaper=BBC |location=UK |date=2014-12-28 |access-date=2014-12-28}} in Russian air force and naval activity in the Baltic region prompted NATO to step up its longstanding rotation of military jets in Lithuania.{{cite news |title=Four RAF Typhoon jets head for Lithuania deployment |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-27183642 |newspaper=BBC |location=UK |date=2014-04-28 |access-date=2014-12-28}}

File:Vladimir Putin and Barack Obama (2013-06-17).jpg at the 39th G8 summit in Northern Ireland on 17 June 2013]]

Similar Russian Air Force activity in the Asia-Pacific region, relying on the resumed use of the previously abandoned Soviet military base at Cam Ranh Bay, Vietnam, in 2014, was officially acknowledged by Russia in January 2015.{{cite news |url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-vietnam-russia-exclusive-idUSKBN0M71NA20150311 |work=Reuters |title=U.S. asks Vietnam to stop helping Russian bomber flights |date=2015-03-11 |access-date=2015-04-12}} In March 2015, Russia's defense minister Sergey Shoygu said that Russia's strategic bombers would continue patrolling various parts of the world and expand into other regions.{{cite news |title=Russian Strategic Bombers To Continue Patrolling Missions |url=http://www.rferl.org/content/russian-strategic-bombers-to-continue-patrolling-missions/26877218.html |publisher=Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty |date=2015-03-02 |access-date=2015-03-02}}

In July 2014, the U.S. formally accused Russia of having violated the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty by testing a prohibited medium-range ground-launched cruise missile (presumably R-500,{{cite journal|url=http://csis.org/publication/russian-inf-treaty-violations-assessment-and-response|title=Russian INF Treaty Violations: Assessment and Response|website=csis.org|date=16 October 2014 |access-date=27 September 2017|last1=Schwartz |first1=Paul N. }} a modification of Iskander){{cite news |title=U.S. Says Russia Tested Cruise Missile, Violating Treaty |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/29/world/europe/us-says-russia-tested-cruise-missile-in-violation-of-treaty.html |newspaper=The New York Times |location=USA |date=2014-07-28 |access-date=2015-01-04 |first=Michael R. |last=Gordon}} and threatened to retaliate accordingly.{{cite news |title=US and Russia in danger of returning to era of nuclear rivalry |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/jan/04/us-russia-era-nuclear-rivalry |newspaper=The Guardian |location=UK |date=2015-01-04 |access-date=2015-01-04}} In early June 2015, the U.S. State Department reported that Russia had failed to correct the violation of the I.N.F. Treaty; the U.S. government was said to have made no discernible headway in making Russia so much as acknowledge the compliance problem.{{cite news |title=U.S. Says Russia Failed to Correct Violation of Landmark 1987 Arms Control Deal |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/06/world/europe/us-says-russia-fails-to-correct-violation-of-landmark-1987-arms-control-deal.html?_r=0 |newspaper=The New York Times |location=US |date=2015-06-05 |access-date=2015-06-07 |first=Michael R. |last=Gordon}}

The US government's October 2014 report claimed that Russia had 1,643 nuclear warheads ready to launch (an increase from 1,537 in 2011) – one more than the US, thus overtaking the US for the first time since 2000; both countries' deployed capacity being in violation of the 2010 New START treaty that sets a cap of 1,550 nuclear warheads.{{cite news |author=Matthew Bodner |title=Russia Overtakes U.S. in Nuclear Warhead Deployment |url=http://www.themoscowtimes.com/business/article/russia-overtakes-u-s-in-nuclear-warhead-deployment-/508409.html |newspaper=The Moscow Times |location=Moscow |date=2014-10-03 |access-date=2014-12-28}} Likewise, even before 2014, the US had set about implementing a large-scale program, worth up to a trillion dollars, aimed at overall revitalization of its atomic energy industry, which includes plans for a new generation of weapon carriers and construction of such sites as the Chemistry and Metallurgy Research Replacement Facility in Los Alamos, New Mexico and the National Security Campus in south Kansas City.[http://cns.miis.edu/opapers/pdfs/140107_trillion_dollar_nuclear_triad.pdf The Trillion Dollar Nuclear Triad] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160123002308/http://cns.miis.edu/opapers/pdfs/140107_trillion_dollar_nuclear_triad.pdf |date=2016-01-23 }} James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies: Monterey, CA. January 2014.{{cite news |title=U.S. Ramping Up Major Renewal in Nuclear Arms |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/22/us/us-ramping-up-major-renewal-in-nuclear-arms.html?_r=0 |newspaper=The New York Times |location=USA |date=2014-09-21 |access-date=2015-01-05 |first1=William J. |last1=Broad |first2=David E. |last2=Sanger}}

At the end of 2014, Putin approved a revised national military doctrine, which listed NATO's military buildup near the Russian borders as the top military threat.{{cite web|url=http://www.worldpoliticsreview.com/articles/14758/russia-s-new-military-doctrine-hypes-nato-threat|title=Russia's New Military Doctrine Hypes NATO Threat|website=www.worldpoliticsreview.com|date=30 December 2014 |access-date=27 September 2017}}[http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/12/26/putin-signs-new-military-doctrine-naming-nato-as-russias-top-military-threat/ Putin signs new military doctrine naming NATO as Russia's top military threat] National Post, 26 December 2014.

In late June 2015, while on a trip to Estonia, US Defence Secretary Ashton Carter said the U.S. would deploy heavy weapons, including tanks, armoured vehicles and artillery, in Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, and Romania.{{cite news |title=US announces new tank and artillery deployment in Europe |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-33238004 |location=UK |publisher=BBC |date=2015-06-23 |access-date=2015-06-24}} The move was interpreted by Western commentators as marking the beginning of a reorientation of NATO's strategy.{{cite news |title=Nato shifts strategy in Europe to deal with Russia threat |url=http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/dd3604bc-19a8-11e5-8201-cbdb03d71480.html#axzz3e0cPGWLr |location=UK |publisher=FT |date=2015-06-23 |access-date=2015-06-24}} It was called by a senior Russian Defence Ministry official ″the most aggressive act by Washington since the Cold War″{{cite news |title=Putin says Russia beefing up nuclear arsenal, NATO denounces 'saber-rattling' |url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-nuclear-putin-idUSKBN0OW17X20150616 |access-date=27 June 2015 |work=Reuters |date=16 June 2015}} and criticised by the Russian Foreign Ministry as "inadequate in military terms" and "an obvious return by the United States and its allies to the schemes of 'the Cold War'".[http://www.mid.ru/brp_4.nsf/newsline/E5ADC981E95C68DC43257E70006784BD Комментарий Департамента информации и печати МИД России по итогам встречи министров обороны стран-членов НАТО] the RF Foreign Ministry, 26 June 2015.

File:Vladimir Putin and Frank-Walter Steinmeier (2017-10-25) 02.jpg in Moscow, 2017]]

On its part, the U.S. expressed concern over Putin's announcement of plans to add over 40 new ballistic missiles to Russia's nuclear weapons arsenal in 2015. American observers and analysts, such as Steven Pifer, noting that the U.S. had no reason for alarm about the new missiles, provided that Russia remained within the limits of the 2010 New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START), viewed the ratcheting-up of nuclear saber-rattling by Russia's leadership as mainly bluff and bluster designed to conceal Russia's weaknesses;Steven Pifer, Fiona Hill. [https://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/16/opinion/putins-risky-game-of-chicken.html "Putin's Risky Game of Chicken"], The New York Times, 15 June 2015. Retrieved 2015-06-18. however, Pifer suggested that the most alarming motivation behind this rhetoric could be Putin seeing nuclear weapons not merely as tools of deterrence, but as tools of coercion.Steven Pifer. [http://www.brookings.edu/blogs/order-from-chaos/posts/2015/06/17-putin-nuclear-saber-rattling-pifer Putin's nuclear saber-rattling: What is he compensating for?] 17 June 2015.

Meanwhile, at the end of June 2015, it was reported that the production schedule for a new Russian MIRV-equipped, super-heavy thermonuclear intercontinental ballistic missile Sarmat, intended to replace the obsolete Soviet-era SS-18 Satan missiles, was slipping.{{cite news |title=Russian Program to Build World's Biggest Intercontinental Missile Delayed |url=http://www.themoscowtimes.com/business/article/russian-program-to-build-world-s-biggest-intercontinental-missile-delayed/524511.html |access-date=27 June 2015 |newspaper=The Moscow Times |date=26 June 2015}} Also noted by commentators were the inevitable financial and technological constraints that would hamper any real arms race with the West, if such course were to be embarked on by Russia.MacFarquhar, Neil, [http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/06/17/world/europe/putin-40-new-missiles-russian-nuclear-arsenal.html "As Vladimir Putin Talks More Missiles and Might, Cost Tells Another Story"], The New York Times, 16 June 2015. Retrieved 2015-06-17.

On December 25, 2022, in an interview for the national television he accused the West of trying to tear Russia apart and openly declared, that his goal—"to unite the Russian people."{{cite news |title=Putin Says West Aiming to Tear Apart Russia |publisher=Voice of America |url=https://www.voanews.com/a/putin-says-west-aiming-to-tear-apart-russia-/6890771.html |date=2022-12-25 |access-date=2022-12-29}}

On July 28, 2024, Russian President Vladimir Putin threatens to deploy long-range missiles that could hit all of Europe, after the United States announced its intention to deploy long-range missiles in Germany from 2026.{{cite web |title=Putin warns the US of Cold War-style missile crisis |url=https://www.reuters.com/world/putin-warns-united-states-cold-war-style-missile-crisis-2024-07-28/ |date=28 July 2024}}

{{see also|Russia–European Union relations|Poland-Russia relations}}

{{further|Warsaw Pact|Comecon}}

File:Europe-blocs-49-89x4.svg during the Cold War]]

The Russian leadership under Putin sees the fracturing of the political unity within the EU and especially the political unity between the EU and the US as among its main strategic goals.{{cite news|title=Putin's war on the West|url=https://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21643189-ukraine-suffers-it-time-recognise-gravity-russian-threatand-counter?fsrc=nlw |access-date=30 April 2015|newspaper=Economist|date=14 February 2015}} Russia seeks to gain dominant influence in former Eastern Bloc states that are culturally and historically close to it, corrode and undermine Western institutions and values, manipulate public opinion and policy-making throughout Europe.

As the West supported Kosovo's independence, Russia later used the "Kosovo precedent" as justification for its annexation of Crimea and its support of breakaway states in Georgia and Moldova.{{cite news|last1=Czuczka|first1=Tony|last2=Parkin|first2=Brian|title=Merkel Bids to Stall Putin Influence at EU's Balkan Edge|url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-11-20/merkel-bids-to-stall-putin-influence-at-eu-s-balkan-edge.html|access-date=21 December 2014|publisher=Bloomberg L.P.|date=21 November 2014}}[http://www.b92.net/eng/news/politics-article.php?yyyy=2008&mm=01&dd=23&nav_id=47173 Kosovo precedent for 200 territories—Lavrov] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080226060249/http://www.b92.net/eng/news/politics-article.php?yyyy=2008&mm=01&dd=23&nav_id=47173 |date=2008-02-26}}, Tanjug/B92, 23 January 2008

In November 2014, the German government publicly voiced its concern about what it saw as efforts by Putin to spread Russia's 'sphere of influence' beyond former Soviet states in the Balkans in countries such as Serbia, Macedonia, Albania and Bosnia, which could impede those countries' progress towards membership in the European Union.{{cite magazine|title=Putin's Reach: Merkel Concerned about Russian Influence in the Balkans|url=http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/germany-worried-about-russian-influence-in-the-balkans-a-1003427.html|access-date=6 January 2015|magazine=Spiegel|date=17 November 2014}}

A series of Europe's far-right and hard Eurosceptic political parties such as Bulgaria's Ataka, the Alternative for Germany, France's National Front, the Freedom Party of Austria, Italy's Northern League, the Independent Greeks and Hungary's Jobbik, have been reported to be courted or even funded by Russia.{{cite news|title=Far-Right Europe Has a Crush on Moscow|url=http://www.themoscowtimes.com/news/article/far-right-europe-has-a-crush-on-moscow/511827.html|access-date=6 January 2015|newspaper=Moscow Times|date=25 November 2014}}{{cite news|last1=Yardley|first1=Jim|last2=Becker|first2=Jo|title=How Putin Forged a Pipeline Deal That Derailed|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/31/world/europe/how-putin-forged-a-pipeline-deal-that-derailed-.html?module=ArrowsNav&contentCollection=Europe&action=keypress®ion=FixedLeft&pgtype=article|access-date=2 January 2015|newspaper=The New York Times|date=30 December 2014}} Russia's ideological approach to this type of activity is opportunistic: it supports both far-left and far-right groups, the aim being to exacerbate divides in Western states and destabilise the EU through fringe political parties gaining more clout.{{cite news|title=From cold war to hot war|url=https://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21643220-russias-aggression-ukraine-part-broader-and-more-dangerous-confrontation |access-date=30 April 2015|newspaper=Economist|date=14 February 2015}} The success of these parties in the May 2014 European elections caused concern that a coherent pro-Russian block was forming in the European Parliament.{{cite news|title=In the Kremlin's pocket|url=https://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21643222-who-backs-putin-and-why-kremlins-pocket |access-date=30 April 2015|newspaper=Economist|date=14 February 2015}}

In early January 2015, public protests in Hungary broke out against Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán's perceived move towards Russia.{{cite news|title=Hungarian protesters hit out at Orban's 'move towards Russia'|url=https://news.yahoo.com/hungarian-protesters-hit-orbans-move-towards-russia-201353130.html|access-date=3 January 2015|publisher=Yahoo News|date=2 January 2015}} Previously, his government had negotiated secret loans from the Russians, awarded a major nuclear power contract to Rosatom, and made the National Assembly give a green light to Russia's gas pipeline project in contravention to blocking orders from Brussels.{{cite news|last1=Traynor|first1=Ian|title=European leaders fear growth of Russian influence abroad|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/nov/17/european-leaders-fear-growth-russian-influence-angela-merkel-vladmir-putin|access-date=6 January 2015|newspaper=The Guardian|date=17 November 2014}}

In early April 2015, the Polish border guard sources were cited as saying that Poland was preparing to build observation towers along its border with the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad;{{cite news|title=Poland to build Russia border towers at Kaliningrad|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-32194278|access-date=14 April 2015|publisher=BBC|date=6 April 2015}}{{cite news|title=Poland border watchtowers 'planned'|url=http://www.independent.ie/world-news/poland-border-watchtowers-planned-31121959.html|access-date=14 April 2015|newspaper=The Independent|date=6 April 2015}} the move was linked by the mass media to prior official vaguely-worded confirmation,{{cite news|title=Kaliningrad: European fears over Russian missiles|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-25407284|access-date=14 April 2015|publisher= BBC|date=16 December 2013}} in December 2013, of Russia's putative deployment of its advanced modification of nuclear-capable Iskander theatre ballistic missiles in the exclave's territory,{{cite news|last1=Roth|first1=Andrew|title=Deployment of Missiles Is Confirmed by Russia|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/17/world/europe/russia-deploys-missiles-in-western-region.html?_r=0|access-date=14 April 2015|newspaper= New York Times|date=16 December 2013}} as well as more recent, March 2015, unofficial reports of the same nature.{{cite news|url=https://www.reuters.com/article/poland-usa-missiles/update-1-poland-and-u-s-army-hold-joint-air-defence-exercises-near-warsaw-idUSL6N0WN0I820150321|title=REFILE-Poland and U.S. Army hold joint air defence exercises near Warsaw|date=21 March 2015|access-date=27 September 2017|newspaper=Reuters}}

The prime minister of Montenegro Milo Đukanović went on record in October 2015 to claim that Russia was sponsoring the anti-government and anti-NATO protests in Podgorica.{{cite web|url=http://www.gov.me/en/News/153593/Prime-Minister-dukanovic-s-interview-with-Federal-Television-of-Bosnia-and-Herzegovina.html|title=Prime Minister Đukanović: Protests in Podgorica supported by circles around Serbian Ortodox Church, and Russia|website=www.gov.me|access-date=27 September 2017}}

{{see also|India–Russia relations|Sino-Russian relations since 1991|Shanghai Cooperation Organisation}}

File:Vladimir Putin 6 November 2001-5.jpg's Former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee with Russia's president Vladimir Putin in November 2001]]

During his first and second term in office, bilateral trade turnover between India and Russia was modest and stood at US$3 billion, of which Indian exports to Russia were valued at US$908 million. The major Indian exports to Russia are pharmaceuticals; tea, coffee and spices; apparel and clothing; edible preparations; and engineering goods. Main Indian imports from Russia are iron and steel; fertilisers; non-ferrous metals; paper products; coal, coke & briquettes; cereals; and rubber. Indo-Russian trade is expected to reach US$10 billion by 2010. Putin wrote in an article in The Hindu, "The Declaration on Strategic Partnership between India and Russia signed in October 2000 became a truly historic step".{{cite news|author=Vladimir Putin |url=http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/op-ed/for-russia-deepening-friendship-with-india-is-a-top-foreign-policy-priority/article4232857.ece |title=For Russia, deepening friendship with India is a top foreign policy priority by President Vladimir Putin |newspaper=The Hindu |date=2012-12-24 |access-date=2013-06-22}}{{cite web|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-india-20834910 |title=India, Russia sign new defence deals: BBC News |publisher=BBC |date=2012-12-24 |access-date=2013-06-22}}

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh also agreed with his counterpart by stating in a speech given during President Putin's 2012 visit to India, "President Putin is a valued friend of India and the original architect of the India-Russia strategic partnership".{{cite web|author=Rajeev Sharma, specially for RIR |url=http://indrus.in/articles/2012/12/24/13th_indo-russian_summit_reaffirms_time-tested_tie_21243.html |title=13th Indo-Russian Summit reaffirms time-tested ties: Russia & India Report |publisher=Indrus.in |date=2012-12-24 |access-date=2013-06-22}} Both countries closely collaborate on matters of shared national interest these include at the UN, BRICS, G20 and where India has observer status and has been asked by Russia to become a full member.{{Cite web|url=https://www.newkerala.com/news/fullnews-124347.html|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120402221443/http://www.newkerala.com/news/fullnews-124347.html|title=News Story #124347 | newkerala.com|archive-date=2 April 2012|website=www.newkerala.com}} Russia also strongly supports India receiving a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. In addition, Russia has vocally backed India joining the NSG{{cite news|url=http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/russia-supports-india%5Cs-membership-in-nsg/478057/ |title=Russia supports India's membership in NSG |newspaper=Business Standard |date=2012-06-21 |access-date=2013-06-22}} and APEC.{{Cite web|url=http://en.interaffairs.ru/read.php?item=351|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120926041143/http://en.interaffairs.ru/read.php?item=351|title=India and APEC: Centre of Mutual Gravitation: International Affairs|archive-date=26 September 2012}} Moreover, it has also expressed interest in joining SAARC with observer status in which India is a founding member.{{cite web|url=http://news.oneindia.in/2006/11/22/russia-keen-to-join-saarc-as-observer-1164200695.html |title=Russia keen to join SAARC as observer: Oneindia News |publisher=News.oneindia.in |date=2006-11-22 |access-date=2013-06-22}}{{cite web|url=http://www.cris.unu.edu/fileadmin/workingpapers/W-2008-8_01.pdf |title=SAARC The Changing Dimensions: UNU-CRIS Working Papers United Nations University - Comparative Regional Integration Studies |access-date=2013-06-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131020123535/http://www.cris.unu.edu/fileadmin/workingpapers/W-2008-8_01.pdf |archive-date=2013-10-20 }}

File:SCO meeting (2022-09-16).jpg, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and other leaders at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit on 16 September 2022]]

Russia currently is one of only two countries in the world (the other being Japan) that has a mechanism for annual ministerial-level defence reviews with India.{{cite web|author=Rajeev Sharma, specially for RIR |url=http://indrus.in/articles/2012/11/28/top_indian_diplomat_explains_russias_importance_to_india_19391.html |title=Top Indian diplomat explains Russia's importance to India: Russia & India Report |publisher=Indrus.in |date=2012-11-28 |access-date=2013-06-22}} The Indo-Russian Inter-Governmental Commission (IRIGC), which is one of the largest and comprehensive governmental mechanisms that India has had with any country internationally. Almost every department from the Government of India attends it.

File:Vladimir Putin at APEC Summit in Thailand 19-21 October 2003-17.jpg at the 2003 APEC Summit in Thailand]]

Putin's Russia maintains strong and positive relations with other BRIC countries. The country has sought to strengthen ties especially with the People's Republic of China by signing the Treaty of Friendship as well as building the Trans-Siberian oil pipeline geared toward growing Chinese energy needs.{{cite news|url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748704082104575515543164948682|title=Russian Oil Route Will Open to China|first=Jeremy|last=Page|newspaper=The Wall Street Journal|date=26 September 2010|access-date=28 September 2010}} The mutual-security cooperation of the two countries and their central Asian neighbours is facilitated by the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation which was founded in 2001 in Shanghai by the leaders of China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan.

File:Xi Jinping and Vladimir Putin walking past the Beijing Capital Garrison Honor Guard Battalion and children with flags (2024).jpg]]

Following the Peace Mission 2007 military exercises jointly conducted by the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) member states, Putin announced on 17 August 2007 the resumption on a permanent basis of long-distance patrol flights of Russian Air Force Tu-95 and Tu-160 strategic bombers that had been suspended since 1992.

{{ Cite web

|url=http://www.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2007/08/17/2033_type82915_141812.shtml

|title=Press Statement and Responses to Media Questions following the Peace Mission 2007 Counterterrorism Exercises and the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation Summit

|publisher=Presidential Administration of Russia

|date=2007-08-17

|access-date=2010-08-02

|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080531070445/http://www.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2007/08/17/2033_type82915_141812.shtml

|archive-date=2008-05-31

}} The announcement made during the SCO summit in the light of joint Russian-Chinese military exercises, first-ever in history to be held on Russian territory,[http://student.km.ru/view.asp?id=4BD4CBA669F042EAB8331FB653FC38FE&idrubr=5D21D4E03EB74A98AAA30F8F45C5E31E SCO Scares NATO] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120210143912/http://student.km.ru/view.asp?id=4BD4CBA669F042EAB8331FB653FC38FE&idrubr=5D21D4E03EB74A98AAA30F8F45C5E31E |date=2012-02-10 }}, 8 August 2007, KM.ru made some believe that Putin is inclined to set up an anti-NATO bloc or the Asian version of OPEC.[http://www.chas-daily.com/win/2007/08/20/v_034.html?r=3 Russia Over Three Oceans] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120208041825/http://www.chas-daily.com/win/2007/08/20/v_034.html?r=3 |date=2012-02-08 }}, 20 August 2007, "Chas", Latvia

When presented with the suggestion that "Western observers are already likening the SCO to a military organisation that would stand in opposition to NATO", Putin answered that "this kind of comparison is inappropriate in both form and substance". Russian Chief of the General Staff Yury Baluyevsky was quoted as saying that "there should be no talk of creating a military or political alliance or union of any kind, because this would contradict the founding principles of SCO".

File:16th BRICS Summit family photograph (2024).jpg in Kazan, Russia, 23 October 2024]]

The resumption of long-distance flights of Russia's strategic bombers was followed by the announcement by Russian Defense Minister Anatoliy Serdyukov during his meeting with Putin on 5 December 2007, that 11 ships, including the aircraft carrier Kuznetsov, would take part in the first major Russian Navy sortie into the Mediterranean since Soviet times.[http://president.kremlin.ru/appears/2007/12/05/1940_type63378_153373.shtml Beginning of Meeting with Defense Minister Anatoliy Serdyukov] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080608051601/http://president.kremlin.ru/appears/2007/12/05/1940_type63378_153373.shtml |date=June 8, 2008 }}, December 5, 2007, Kremlin.ru The sortie was to be backed up by 47 aircraft, including strategic bombers.[https://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20071205/wl_nm/russia_navy_dc_3 Guy Faulconbridge. Russian navy to start sorties in Mediterranean] Reuters 5 December 2007. According to Serdyukov, this was an effort to resume regular Russian naval patrols on the world's oceans, the view that was also supported by Russian media.[http://www.vz.ru/news/2007/12/5/129713.html Russia's Navy Has Resumed Presence in World Ocean] Vzglyad.ru (Russian) 5 December 2007. The military analyst from Novaya Gazeta Pavel Felgenhauer said that the accident-prone Kuznetsov was scarcely seaworthy and was more of a menace to her crew than any putative enemy.[http://novayagazeta.ru/data/2007/95/17.html Павел Фельгенгауэр. Семь честных слов под килем] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080520014436/http://novayagazeta.ru/data/2007/95/17.html |date=2008-05-20 }} Novaya Gazeta № 95 13 December 2007.

File:Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong-un (2024-06-19) 08.jpg in Pyongyang, North Korea, 19 June 2024]]

According to the Japan Times, Russia increased its economic support for North Korea in an attempt to balance against a potential US-led push to topple the Kim Jong-un regime.{{Cite news|url=https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2017/10/04/asia-pacific/russia-quietly-throws-north-korea-lifeline-bid-stymie-regime-change/|title=Russia quietly throws North Korea lifeline in bid to stymie regime change|last=Osborn|first=Andrew|date=2017-10-04|work=The Japan Times Online|access-date=2017-10-05|language=en-US|issn=0447-5763}} In the event of regime collapse, Russia is worried about losing regional influence as well as the possibility of American troops being deployed to Russia's Eastern border. TransTeleCom (TTK), one of Russia's largest telecommunications companies, is also thought to provide a new internet connection to the country at a time when the US has engaged in denial of service attacks against North Korean hackers thought to be affiliated with the Reconnaissance General Bureau.{{Cite news|url=http://www.38north.org/2017/10/mwilliams100117/|title=Russia Provides New Internet Connection to North Korea {{!}} 38 North: Informed Analysis of North Korea|date=2017-10-01|work=38 North|access-date=2017-10-05|language=en-US}}{{Cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-signed-presidential-directive-ordering-actions-to-pressure-north-korea/2017/09/30/97c6722a-a620-11e7-b14f-f41773cd5a14_story.html|title=Trump signed presidential directive ordering actions to pressure North Korea|last1=DeYoung|first1=Karen|date=2017-09-30|newspaper=Washington Post|access-date=2017-10-05|last2=Nakashima|first2=Ellen|language=en-US|issn=0190-8286|last3=Rauhala|first3=Emily}}

{{Main|Russia and the Middle East}}

File:Vladimir Putin in Iran 16-17 October 2007-3.jpg, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, 2007]]

On 16 October 2007 Putin visited Iran to participate in the Second Caspian Summit in Tehran,[https://web.archive.org/web/20080406094726/http://top.rbc.ru/politics/16/10/2007/122607.shtml Putin: Iran Has Right to Develop Peaceful Nuclear Programme], 16 October 2007, Rbc.ru{{cite news|title=Putin's warning to the U.S.|work=Reuters|date=16 October 2007|url=https://www.reuters.com/news/video/videoStory?videoId=68897|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071017065727/http://www.reuters.com/news/video/videoStory?videoId=68897|archive-date=17 October 2007}} where he met with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.[http://president.kremlin.ru/text/news/2007/10/148432.shtml Putin Positive on Second Caspian Summit Results, Meets With Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080504052206/http://president.kremlin.ru/text/news/2007/10/148432.shtml |date=May 4, 2008 }}, 16 October 2007, Kremlin.ru Other participants were leaders of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, and Turkmenistan.[http://president.kremlin.ru/events/chron/2007/10/148247.shtml Visit to Iran. Second Caspian Summit] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080504052159/http://president.kremlin.ru/events/chron/2007/10/148247.shtml |date=2008-05-04 }}, 15–16 October 2007, Kremlin.ru This was the first visit of a Soviet or Russian leader to Iran since Joseph Stalin's participation in the Tehran Conference in 1943, and thus marked a significant event in Iran–Russia relations.[https://archive.today/20080726124113/http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/europe/article2666142.ece Vladimir Putin defies assassination threats to make historic visit to Tehran], 16 October 2007, The Times. At a press conference after the summit Putin said that "all our (Caspian) states have the right to develop their peaceful nuclear programmes without any restrictions".[http://president.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2007/10/16/2020_type82914type82915_148460.shtml Answer to a Question at the Joint Press Conference Following the Second Caspian Summit] {{webarchive |url=https://web.archive.org/web/20080504052153/http://president.kremlin.ru/eng/speeches/2007/10/16/2020_type82914type82915_148460.shtml |date=May 4, 2008 }}, 16 October 2007, Tehran, Kremlin.ru During the summit it was also agreed that its participants, under no circumstances, would let any third-party state use their territory as a base for aggression or military action against any other participant.

Subsequently, under Medvedev's presidency, Iran–Russia relations were uneven: Russia did not fulfill the contract of selling to Iran the S-300, one of the most potent anti-aircraft missile systems currently existing. However, Russian specialists completed the construction of Iran and the Middle East's first civilian nuclear power facility, the Bushehr Nuclear Power Plant, and Russia has continuously opposed the imposition of economic sanctions on Iran by the U.S. and the EU, as well as warning against a military attack on Iran. Putin was quoted as describing Iran as a "partner", though he expressed concerns over the Iranian nuclear programme.

File:Vladimir Putin and Muammar Gaddafi in Moscow 1 Nov 2008-1.jpeg

In April 2008, Putin visited Libya where he met the leader Muammar Gaddafi, the country welcomed the idea of creating an OPEC-like group of gas-exporting countries, Putin became first Russian President who visited Libya, he remarked the visit as "We are satisfied about the way in which we resolved this problem. I am absolutely convinced that the solution we have found will help the Russian and Libyan economies."{{cite web |url=http://gulfnews.com/news/region/libya/putin-s-visit-historic-and-strategic-1.98399 |title=Putin's visit 'historic and strategic' |publisher=gulfnews |date=2008-04-18 |access-date=2013-06-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130514014600/http://gulfnews.com/news/region/libya/putin-s-visit-historic-and-strategic-1.98399 |archive-date=2013-05-14 }}

Putin condemned the foreign military intervention in Libya, he called UNSC Resolution 1973 as "defective and flawed," and added "It allows everything. It resembles medieval calls for crusades.",{{cite news| url=https://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/03/21/putin-libya-intervention-_n_838293.html | work=Huffington Post | first=Cara | last=Parks | title=Putin: Military Intervention In Libya Resembles 'Crusades' | date=21 March 2011}} During the whole event, Putin condemned other steps taken by NATO.{{citation needed|date=December 2020}} Upon the death of Muammar Gaddafi, Putin called it as "planned murder" by US, he asked "They showed to the whole world how he (Gaddafi) was killed," and "There was blood all over. Is that what they call a democracy?"{{cite web|url=http://www.mediaite.com/online/vladimir-putin-blames-us-drones-for-gaddafi-death-slams-john-mccain/ |title=Vladimir Putin Blames US Drones For Gaddafi Death, Slams John McCain |publisher=Mediaite |date=2011-12-15 |access-date=2013-06-22}}{{cite web|last=Citizen |first=Ottawa |url=http://canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/world/story.html?id=883c4e8f-cd01-4705-b446-fe9c72d3a291 |title=Putin claims U.S. planned murder of Gadhafi |publisher=Canada.com |date=2011-12-16 |access-date=2013-06-22 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131020152422/http://www.canada.com/ottawacitizen/news/world/story.html?id=883c4e8f-cd01-4705-b446-fe9c72d3a291 |archive-date=2013-10-20 }}

Dmitri Trenin reports in The New York Times that from 2000 to 2010 Russia sold around $1.5 billion worth of arms to Syria, making Damascus Moscow's seventh-largest client.{{cite news| url=https://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/10/opinion/why-russia-supports-assad.html?_r=2&partner=rss&emc=rss | work=The New York Times | first=Dmitri | last=Trenin | title=Why Russia Supports Assad | date=9 February 2012}}

During the Syrian civil war, Russia threatened to veto any sanctions against the Syrian government,{{cite web|author=Fred Weir |url=http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Europe/2012/0119/Why-Russia-is-willing-to-sell-arms-to-Syria |title=Why Russia is willing to sell arms to Syria |publisher=CSMonitor.com |date=2012-01-19 |access-date=2013-06-22}} and continued to supply arms to the regime.

Putin opposed any foreign intervention. On 1 June 2012, in Paris, he rejected the statement of French President Francois Hollande who called on Bashar al-Assad to step down. Putin echoed the argument of the Assad regime that anti-regime militants were responsible for much of the bloodshed, rather than the shelling by the Syrian Armed Forces and the civilian killings attributed by survivors and Western governments to regime supporters. He asked "But how many of peaceful people (sic) were killed by so-called militants? Did you count? There are also hundreds of victims." He also talked about previous NATO interventions and their results, and asked "What is happening in Libya, in Iraq? Did they become safer? Where are they heading? Nobody has an answer."{{cite magazine|last=Viscusi |first=Gregory |url=http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-06-01/hollande-clashes-with-putin-over-ouster-of-syria-s-assad |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120718174702/http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-06-01/hollande-clashes-with-putin-over-ouster-of-syria-s-assad |archive-date=18 July 2012 |title=Hollande Clashes With Putin Over Ouster of Syria's Assad |magazine=Businessweek |date=2012-06-01 |access-date=2013-06-22}}

File:Three leaders (2022-07-19).jpg, Ebrahim Raisi and Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan in Tehran, 19 July 2022]]

On 11 September 2013, an opinion, written by Putin, was published in The New York Times regarding international events related to the United States, Russia and Syria.{{cite news |last=Putin |first=Vladimir V. |title=A Plea for Caution From Russia |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/12/opinion/putin-plea-for-caution-from-russia-on-syria.html |date=11 September 2013 |work=The New York Times |access-date=11 September 2013 }}

{{main|Color revolutions|Russia–Ukraine gas disputes|Russia–Ukraine relations|Belarus–Russia relations|Georgia–Russia relations|Moldova–Russia relations|Kyrgyzstan–Russia relations|Eurasian Union}}

A series of so-called color revolutions in the post-Soviet states, namely the Rose Revolution in Georgia in 2003, the Orange Revolution in Ukraine in 2004 and the Tulip Revolution in Kyrgyzstan in 2005, led to frictions in the relations of those countries with Russia. In December 2004, Putin criticised the Rose and Orange Revolution, according to him: "If you have permanent revolutions you risk plunging the post-Soviet space into endless conflict". During the protests following the 2011 Russian elections (in December 2011) Putin named the Orange Revolution as a potential precedent of what was going to happen in Russia.[http://www.kyivpost.com/news/russia/detail/118993/ Putin calls 'color revolutions' an instrument of destabilization], Kyiv Post (15 December 2011)

File:Vladimir Putin 22 February 2008-1.jpg of Georgia in 2008]]

Apart from a clash of nationalist rhetorics{{Clarify|date=March 2012}} with the common historical legacies of the Soviet Union and the Russian Empire{{Citation needed|date=March 2012}}, a number of economic disputes erupted between Russia and some neighbours, such as the 2006 Russian ban of Moldovan and Georgian wines. Moscow's policies under Putin towards these states were described as "efforts to bully democratic neighbors" by John McCain in 2007.{{cite magazine

| last = McCain

| first = John

| title = An Enduring Peace Built on Freedom: Securing America's Future

| magazine= Foreign Affairs

| date = November–December 2007

| volume = 86

| issue = 6

| url = https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/2007-11-01/enduring-peace-built-freedom |url-access=subscription | access-date = 2008-02-06}}

In some cases, such as the Russia–Ukraine gas disputes, the economic conflicts affected other European countries, for example when a January 2009 gas dispute with Ukraine led state-controlled Russian company Gazprom to halt its deliveries of natural gas to Ukraine,[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7240462.stm Q&A: Russia-Ukraine gas row], BBC News (20 January 2009). which left a number of European states, to which Ukraine transits Russian gas, to have serious shortages of natural gas in January 2009.

In an interview with the German historian Michael Stürmer about the Russian shut-down of gas to Ukraine in early 2005, Putin linked the shut-down to the Orange revolution, saying: "This has a price [the Orange revolution]. In spite of so much frustration we have stabilised the situation. In old days we concluded agreements with Ukraine year after year, and then included transit fees. The West Europeans had no idea that their energy security was a cliffhanger. By now we have a five-year agreement for transit to the E.U. This is an important step in the direction of European energy security".

File:CSTO Summit 2022 02.jpg (CSTO), in Moscow on 16 May 2022]]

In 2009, the Russia–Ukraine dispute was resolved by a long-term agreement on price formula, agreed by Prime Ministers Vladimir Putin of Russia and Prime Minister of Ukraine Yulia Tymoshenko[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7839053.stm Russia opens gas taps to Europe], BBC News (20 January 2009) (later, when the rising global oil prices prompted the rising gas prizes{{cite web|url=http://www.mongabay.com/images/commodities/charts/chart-ngeu.html|title=Natural gas, Europe price chart|publisher=Mongabay|access-date=27 September 2017|archive-url=http://arquivo.pt/wayback/20091010025046/http://www.mongabay.com/images/commodities/charts/chart-ngeu.html|archive-date=10 October 2009|df=dmy-all}} the agreement turned very unfavourable for Ukraine; in October 2011 Tymoshenko was found guilty of abuse of office when brokering the 2009 deal and was sentenced to seven years in prison).[https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-15250742 Ukraine ex-PM Yulia Tymoshenko jailed over gas deal], BBC News (11 October 2011)

The plans of Georgia and Ukraine to become members of NATO have caused some tensions between Russia and those states. In 2010, Ukraine did abandon these plans.[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/10229626.stm Ukraine's parliament votes to abandon Nato ambitions], BBC News (3 June 2010) In public Putin has stated that Russia has no intention of annexing any country.[http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/4122721.stm Polish head rejects Putin attack], BBC News (24 December 2004)

File:Vladimir Putin 13 May 2002-3.jpg President Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus, with Vladimir Putin in 2002. Despite a number of economic disputes in the mid-2000s, Belarus has remained one of Russia's closest allies.]]

Putin, in his relations with Russo-centric neighbor and former Soviet Republic of Belarus, continued the general trend towards closer bi-lateral ties between the two countries, which has thus far stopped short of extending the depth of the Union of Russia and Belarus proposed and speculated by many media outlets both inside and outside Russia.[http://www.csmonitor.com/2007/1210/p01s02-woeu.html "Putin eyes full merger with Belarus"], 10 December 2007.

File:Customs Union of Belarus, Kazakhstan, and Russia (orthographic projection) - Crimea disputed.svg with the most likely immediate members: Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan]]

In August 2008, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili attempted to restore control over the breakaway South Ossetia, claiming this action was in response to Ossetian border attacks on Georgians and to alleged buildups of Russian non-peacekeeping forces. Russian "peacekeepers" fought alongside the South Ossetians as Georgian troops pushed into the province and seized most of the capital of Tskhinvali. However, the Georgian military was soon defeated in the resulting 2008 South Ossetia War after regular Russian forces entered South Ossetia and then Georgia proper, and also opened a second front in the other Georgian breakaway province of Abkhazia together with Abkhazian forces.{{cite web |url=http://www.heritage.org/research/RussiaandEurasia/wm2017.cfm |title=Russia and Eurasia |publisher=Heritage.org |access-date=2009-05-10 |url-status=unfit |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20090425165904/http://www.heritage.org/Research/RussiaandEurasia/wm2017.cfm |archive-date=25 April 2009 }}{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7551576.stm|title=Day-by-day: Georgia-Russia crisis|work=BBC News|date=21 August 2008|access-date=2009-05-10}} During this conflict, according to high level French diplomat Jean-David Levitte, Putin intended to depose the Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili and declared: "I am going to hang Saakashvili by the balls".{{Cite web|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/russia/3454154/Vladimir-Putin-threatened-to-hang-Georgia-leader-by-the-balls.html|title = Vladimir Putin threatened to hang Georgia leader 'by the balls'| date=13 November 2008 }}

Putin blamed the 2008 war and the bad relations between Russia and Georgia as "the result of the policy that the Georgian authorities conducted back then and still attempt to conduct now"; he stated that Georgia is a "brotherly nation that hopefully will finally understand that Russia is not an enemy, but is a friend and the relations will be restored."{{citation needed|date=December 2020}} Putin stated in 2009 Georgia could have kept Abkhazia and South Ossetia "within its territory" if it had treated the residents of Abkhazia and South Ossetia "with respect" (he claims they did "the opposite").[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BO2E94DT4-Q Putin on Georgia's territorial integrity], RT via YouTube (8 Augustus 2009)

During the 2004 Ukrainian presidential election, Putin twice visited Ukraine before the election to show his support for Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych, who was widely seen as a pro-Kremlin candidate, and he congratulated him on his anticipated victory before the official election returns had been in. Putin's personal support for Yanukovych was criticised as unwarranted interference in the affairs of a sovereign state (See also The Orange revolution). {{Citation needed|date=September 2008}} According to a document uncovered during the United States diplomatic cables leak Putin "implicitly challenged" the territorial integrity of Ukraine at the April 4, 2008, NATO-Russia Council Summit in Bucharest, Romania.[http://www.kyivpost.com/news/nation/detail/91772/ After Russian invasion of Georgia, Putin's words stir fears about Ukraine]. Kyiv Post (30 November 2010) In a televised meeting with military bloggers on 13 June 2023 Putin stated that, the winner of the 2004 Ukrainian presidential election, Viktor Yushchenko had come to power with the help of a coup d'etat, which "at least took place in a relatively peaceful way."{{cite web |title=Putin said that the Russian Federation was not given a chance to build normal relations with the Ukrainian people|url=https://tass.ru/politika/17996675|website=TASS|date=13 June 2023|access-date=13 June 2023|language=Russian}}

The President of Ukraine elected during the Orange Revolution, Viktor Yushchenko, was succeeded in 2010 by Viktor Yanukovych, that led to improved relations with Russia.{{cite web|url=https://www.hrw.org/world-report-2011/ukraine|title=World Report 2011: Ukraine|date=24 January 2011|access-date=27 September 2017|archive-date=2013-10-30 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131030210128/http://www.hrw.org/world-report-2011/ukraine|url-status=dead}} Russia was able to expand the lease for the base for its Black Sea Fleet base in the Ukrainian city Sevastopol in exchange for lower gas prices for Ukraine (the 2010 Ukrainian–Russian Naval Base for Natural Gas treaty).[http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/europe/04/21/russia.ukraine/index.html?hpt=T2 Russia, Ukraine agree on naval-base-for-gas deal], CNN (21 April 2010) The President of Kyrgyzstan since 2009, Almazbek Atambayev, wants to guide Kyrgyzstan towards the Customs Union of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia and has stated his country has a "common future" with its neighbours and Russia.{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-16187957|title=Kyrgyzstan profile|work=BBC News|date=30 July 2014|access-date=27 September 2017}}

File:Мацква.ру, репортаж с Парада Победы 2023 на Красной площади, фото 21.jpg leaders from Central Asia at the 2023 Moscow Victory Day Parade]]

Despite existing or past tensions between Russia and most of the post-Soviet states, Putin has followed the policy of Eurasian integration. The Customs Union of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia has already brought partial economic unity between the three states, and the proposed Eurasian Union is said to be a continuation of this customs union. Putin endorsed the idea of a Eurasion Union in 2011,[https://web.archive.org/web/20130604193552/http://www.america-russia.net/eng/geopolitics/288470359 New Integration Project for Eurasia – A Future That Is Being Born Today], Izvestiya (3 October 2011){{Cite web|url=https://iz.ru/news|title=Главные и последние новости дня на iz.ru | Известия|website=iz.ru|date=21 June 2023 }}{{cite news|title=Russia's Putin says wants to build "Eurasian Union" |first=Gleb |last=Bryanski |url=https://news.yahoo.com/russias-putin-says-wants-build-eurasian-union-222139037.html |publisher=Yahoo! News |agency=Reuters |date=3 October 2011 |access-date=4 October 2011 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111006174652/http://news.yahoo.com/russias-putin-says-wants-build-eurasian-union-222139037.html |archive-date=October 6, 2011 }}{{cite news|script-title=ru:Новый интеграционный проект для Евразии – будущее, которое рождается сегодня|url=http://www.izvestia.ru/news/502761|newspaper=Izvestia|language=ru|date=3 October 2011|access-date=4 October 2011}} (the concept was proposed by the President of Kazakhstan in 1994).{{cite news|title=Kazakhstan welcomes Putin's Eurasian Union concept|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/kazakhstan/8808500/Kazakhstan-welcomes-Putins-Eurasian-Union-concept.html|newspaper=The Daily Telegraph|date=6 October 2011|access-date=8 October 2011|location=London|first=James|last=Kilner}} On 18 November 2011, the presidents of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia signed an agreement, setting a target of establishing the Eurasian Union by 2015.{{cite news|title=Russia sees union with Belarus and Kazakhstan by 2015|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-15790452|work=BBC News|date=18 November 2011|access-date=19 November 2011}} The agreement included the roadmap for the future integration and established the Eurasian Commission (modelled on the European Commission) and the Eurasian Economic Space, which started work on 1 January 2012.{{cite news|script-title=ru:Евразийские комиссары получат статус федеральных министров|url=http://news.tut.by/politics/259307.html|publisher=Tut.By|language=ru|date=17 November 2011|access-date=19 November 2011|archive-date=2019-10-09 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20191009110040/https://news.tut.by/politics/259307.html|url-status=dead}}

{{main|Russo-Ukrainian War|Russia–Ukraine relations}}

File:Vladimir Putin with Leonid Kuchma-4.jpg (Crimea) aboard the Ukrainian Navy frigate Hetman Sahaidachny with Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma on 18 April 2000]]

During the 2008 Bucharest summit Vladimir Putin stated that Ukraine "in its current form" was an artificial creation because the USSR had gifted it from Russia eastern and southern Ukraine and that Crimea was given to Ukraine by the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet. Putin also claimed that one third of the population of Ukraine was ethnical Russian. According to the October 2010 Springer Publishing publication Key Players and Regional Dynamics in Eurasia: The Return of the 'Great Game' Putin also said to U.S. President George W. Bush that if Ukraine would join Nato Russia would detach eastern Ukraine and Crimea from Russia and would graft it on to Russia.[https://books.google.com/books?id=u2SHDAAAQBAJ&dq=2008+Bucharest+summit+Putin+Ukraine&pg=PA35 Key Players and Regional Dynamics in Eurasia: The Return of the 'Great Game'] by M. Freire % R. Kanet, October 2010, Springer Publishing (page 35) In a televised meeting with military bloggers on 13 June 2023 Putin stated a Ukrainian entry in NATO as discussed in 2008 would mean that "historical territories with a Russian-speaking population are in NATO."{{cite web |title=Putin called attempts to draw Russian-speaking territories of Ukraine into NATO "outrageous"|url=https://tass.ru/politika/17998525|website=TASS|date=13 June 2023|access-date=13 June 2023|language=Russian}}

In a July 2013 visit to Kyiv, Putin stated that whatever Ukraine would decide about its future "we still meet again sometime and somewhere" "because we are one people."{{cite book |last=Wilson |first=Andrew |date=2014 |title=Ukraine Crisis: What it Means for the West |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=NMK2BAAAQBAJ&dq=Putin+Ukraine+%22one+people%22&pg=PT172 |location=New Haven and London |publisher=Yale University Press |page=126|isbn=978-0-300-21159-7}}

On 27 February 2014, Russian troops{{Cite news|last=Weaver|first=Courtney|date=15 March 2015|title=Putin was ready to put nuclear weapons on alert in Crimea crisis|work=Financial Times|url=https://www.ft.com/content/41873ed2-cb60-11e4-8ad9-00144feab7de|url-access=subscription|access-date=23 January 2022|archive-url=https://archive.today/20210211231429/https://www.ft.com/content/41873ed2-cb60-11e4-8ad9-00144feab7de|archive-date=11 February 2021|url-status=live}} captured strategic sites across Crimea,{{cite news|url=https://time.com/19097/putin-crimea-russia-ukraine-aksyonov/|title=Putin's Man in Crimea Is Ukraine's Worst Nightmare|author=Simon Shuster|date=10 March 2014|magazine=Time|access-date=8 March 2015|quote=Before dawn on Feb. 27, at least two dozen heavily armed men stormed the Crimean parliament building and the nearby headquarters of the regional government, bringing with them a cache of assault rifles and rocket propelled grenades. A few hours later, Aksyonov walked into the parliament and, after a brief round of talks with the gunmen, began to gather a quorum of the chamber's lawmakers.}}{{cite news|last=De Carbonnel|first=Alissa|date=13 March 2014|title=RPT-INSIGHT-How the separatists delivered Crimea to Moscow|work=Reuters|url=https://reuters.com/article/ukraine-crisis-russia-aksyonov-idINL6N0M93AH20140313|access-date=8 March 2015|quote=Only a week after gunmen planted the Russian flag on the local parliament, Aksyonov and his allies held another vote and declared parliament was appealing to Putin to annex Crimea}} Although Russia initially claimed their military was not involved in the events,{{cite web|last1=Baczynska|first1=Gabriela|last2=Toyer|first2=Julien|date=5 March 2014|editor-last=Gutterman|editor-first=Steve|title=Russia says cannot order Crimean 'self-defense' units back to base.|url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-crisis-lavrov-spain-idUSBREA240NF20140305|website=Reuters}} Putin later admitted that troops were deployed to "stand behind Crimea's self-defence forces".{{cite news|title=Putin reveals secrets of Russia's Crimea takeover plot|work=BBC News|date=9 March 2015|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-31796226|access-date=9 March 2015}}
{{cite news|last1=Soldatkin|first1=Vladimir|last2=Stamp|first2=David|date=9 March 2014|title=Putin says plan to take Crimea hatched before referendum|url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-crisis-putin-crimea-idUSKBN0M51DG20150309|work=Reuters|access-date=10 March 2015}} The same day the pro-Russian Aksyonov government in Crimea was installed, they organised the Crimean status referendum and the declaration of Crimea's independence on 16 March 2014.{{cite news|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2014/05/06/russian-government-agency-reveals-fraudulent-nature-of-the-crimean-referendum-results/|title=Russian government agency reveals fraudulent nature of the Crimean referendum results|newspaper=The Washington Post|author=Ilya Somin|date=6 May 2014}}{{cite web|url=http://zakon4.rada.gov.ua/laws/show/891-18|script-title=uk:Про дострокове припинення повноважень Верховної Ради Автономної Республіки Крим|trans-title=On the dissolution of the Verkhovna Rada of the Autonomous Republic of Crimea|language=uk|website=Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine|date=15 March 2014 }} Russia formally incorporated Crimea on 18 March 2014.{{cite web|url = https://www.regjeringen.no/en/aktuelt/crimea_annexion/id2593565/|title = Four years since Russia's illegal annexation of Crimea|website=Government.no|date=14 March 2018|access-date=28 March 2019}} Russia was excluded one week later from the G8 group as a result of its annexation of Crimea.[https://edition.cnn.com/2014/03/24/politics/obama-europe-trip/ U.S., other powers kick Russia out of G8], CNN On 18 March 2014 Putin made gave a historical speech about the situation in Crimea.Putin, Vladimir. [http://eng.kremlin.ru/transcripts/6889 "Address by President of the Russian Federation"], Kremlin Web Site (18 March 2014). In this speech Putin stated that Russia will always defend the interests of Russian-speaking Ukrainians by using political, diplomatic and legal means.[https://books.google.com/books?id=qzuhDwAAQBAJ&dq=Ukraine+will+continue+to+live+millions+of+Russian+citizens%2C+which+means+that+Russia+will+always+defend+their+interests&pg=PT175 The Duty of Care in International Relations: Protecting Citizens Beyond the Border] by Nina Graeger and Halvard Leira, Routledge (July 2019) In the speech Putin also insisted that Russia had no intention to invade or seize other regions of Ukraine.[https://www.cbsnews.com/news/russia-president-vladimir-putin-approves-draft-bill-to-annex-crimea-after-residents-vote-to-leave-ukraine/ Russia President Vladimir Putin signs treaty to annex Crimea after residents vote to leave Ukraine], CBS News (18 March 2014){{Cite web |date=2022-09-30 |title=Putin's annexation speech: more angry taxi driver than head of state |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/sep/30/putin-annexation-speech-more-angry-taxi-driver-than-head-of-state-ukraine |access-date=2022-10-01 |website=The Guardian |language=en |archive-date=6 October 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221006222611/https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/sep/30/putin-annexation-speech-more-angry-taxi-driver-than-head-of-state-ukraine |url-status=live }} Putin also claimed in his speech that the new leaders in Ukraine included "neo-Nazis, Russophobes and anti-Semites" and said: "Don't believe those who try to frighten you with Russia and who scream that other regions will follow after Crimea", "we do not want a partition of Ukraine".{{cite web|url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-crisis-idUSBREA1Q1E820140318|title=Putin signs Crimea treaty as Ukraine serviceman dies in attack|website=Reuters|date=18 March 2014}}

File:Vladimir Putin answered journalists’ questions on the situation in Ukraine (2014-03-04).jpeg]]

Russia's Permanent Representative to the United Nations Vitaly Churkin told the UN Security Council on 4 March 2014 that ousted Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych had asked Russia to send troops across the Russia–Ukraine border to protect civilians via a letter to President Putin on 1 March 2014.[https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26427848 Ukraine's Yanukovych asked for troops, Russia tells UN], BBC News (4 March 2014) On 4 March 2014 Putin answered questions of reporters about the situation in Crimea.{{cite web|url=http://eng.kremlin.ru/news/6763|title=Vladimir Putin answered journalists' questions on the situation in Ukraine|website=Kremlin.ru|date=4 March 2014|access-date=21 December 2022}} In this interview he claimed that his biggest concern was "the rampage of reactionary forces, nationalist and anti-Semitic forces going on in certain parts of Ukraine, including Kiev." According to Putin the ousting of Yanukovych had been illegal. Putin also told journalists "if I do decide to use the Armed Forces, this will be a legitimate decision in full compliance with both general norms of international law, since we have the appeal of the legitimate President." Earlier on 28 February 2014 BBC News reported Yanukovych as insisting that military action was "unacceptable" and as stating that he would not request Russian military intervention.[https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-26386946 Ukrainian ex-leader Viktor Yanukovych vows fightback], BBC News (28 February 2014)

The annexation of Crimea took place during wider pro-Russian protests across southern and eastern Ukraine in which the Donetsk People's Republic and Luhansk People's Republic, armed Russian-backed separatist groups in the Donbas region of Ukraine unilaterally declared themselves independent from Ukraine (in April 2014) leading to armed conflict with Ukrainian government forces.{{Cite news |last=Grytsenko |first=Oksana |date=12 April 2014 |title=Armed pro-Russian insurgents in Luhansk say they are ready for police raid |work=Kyiv Post |url=http://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine/armed-pro-russian-insurgents-in-luhansk-say-they-are-ready-for-police-raid-343167.html |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140412131249/http://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine/armed-pro-russian-insurgents-in-luhansk-say-they-are-ready-for-police-raid-343167.html |archive-date=12 April 2014}} The proclaimed republics remained unrecognised by any of the UN member states including Russia, although Russia did (since February 2017) recognises documents issued by it such as identity documents, diplomas, birth and marriage certificates and vehicle registration plates.[http://mobile.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN15X0KR Putin orders Russia to recognize documents issued in rebel-held east Ukraine], Reuters (18 February 2017) From 2019 to May 2021 Russia issued over 650,000 internal Russian passports among an unconfirmed overall population of the unrecognised republics.{{cite news |date=9 April 2021 |title=Kremlin defends Russian military buildup on Ukraine border |work=The Guardian |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/apr/09/kremlin-officials-say-russia-will-not-stand-aside-if-kyiv-launches-assault}}{{cite news |date=20 May 2021 |title=Zelenskiy: Russian passports in Donbas are a step towards 'annexation' |work=Reuters |url=https://www.reuters.com/world/ukraine-sees-russias-issuance-passports-eastern-ukraine-step-towards-annexation-2021-05-20/}} Russia has been accused of aiding, including sending military troops to fight alongside separatists forces, the breakaway republics but has always denied this.[http://www.rferl.org/a/monitor-osce-says-ukraine-cease-fire-heavy-weapons-withdrawal-not-honored/28324012.html Monitor Says Ukraine Cease-Fire, Weapons Withdrawal Not Being Honored], Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (22 February 2017){{Cite web|url=http://www.osce.org/ukraine-smm/175736|title=Latest from OSCE Special Monitoring Mission (SMM) to Ukraine based on information received as of 19:30 (Kyiv time), 2 August 2015|date=3 August 2015|publisher=OSCE|access-date=4 August 2015|archive-date=23 February 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220223215516/https://www.osce.org/ukraine-smm/175736|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|url=http://korrespondent.net/world/russia/3547423-mynoborony-rf-oproverhaet-slova-obse-o-suschestvovanyy-16-y-bryhady-vdv|title=Минобороны РФ опровергает слова ОБСЕ о существовании 16-й бригады ВДВ|date=4 August 2015|publisher=Korrespondent.net|access-date=4 August 2015|archive-date=6 August 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150806211416/http://korrespondent.net/world/russia/3547423-mynoborony-rf-oproverhaet-slova-obse-o-suschestvovanyy-16-y-bryhady-vdv|url-status=live}}{{Cite web|url=http://www.rferl.org/content/osce-russia-ukraine-troops-report/27171430.html|title=Kremlin Downplays OSCE Report Of Russian Troops In Eastern Ukraine|date=5 August 2015|publisher=REF/RL|access-date=5 August 2015|archive-date=5 August 2015|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150805195732/http://www.rferl.org/content/osce-russia-ukraine-troops-report/27171430.html|url-status=live}}

In a visit to Crimea in August 2015, Putin stated that Russians and Ukrainians are "practically one people."[https://books.google.com/books?id=C9f9DwAAQBAJ&dq=Putin+Ukraine+%22one+people%22&pg=PA18 The Post-Soviet Conflicts: The Thirty Years' Crisis] by Stefan Brooks, page 18, Lexington Books (October 7, 2020)

In the March 2015 documentary Crimea. The Way Home Putin claimed he told top security officials of his intent to annex Crimea on 24 February 2014.[https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2015/03/vladimir-putins-documentary-is-trying-to-rewrite-history-crimea-the-way-home-is-the-newest-in-slick-russian-propaganda.html Vladimir Putin's new faux documentary is trying to rewrite the history of his own aggression.], Slate (March 19, 2015)
[https://www.rferl.org/a/from-not-us-to-why-hide-it-how-russia-denied-its-crimea-invasion-then-admitted-it/29791806.html From 'Not Us' To 'Why Hide It?': How Russia Denied Its Crimea Invasion, Then Admitted It], Radio Free Europe (February 26, 2019) In the documentary Putin stated his decision to deploy Russian troops in Crimea was necessary to protect the population of Crimea "from violence and repression by Ukrainian nationalists."

File:On the Day of Defenders of Ukraine, the President honored the memory of the fallen warriors. (52437349696).jpg in 2014]]

In the Direct Line with Vladimir Putin of April 2015 Putin stated that he did "presume it's impossible" that a war between Russian and Ukraine would break out.[https://tass.com/russia/789807 Putin: war with Ukraine impossible], TASS news agency (16 April 2015)

When in June 2017 the Ukrainian parliament enshrined in law Ukraine's priority of acceding to NATO membership Putin's press secretary Dmitry Peskov responded by saying that an eastern enlargement of NATO "threatens our security and the balance of forces in the Eurasian region. Naturally, the Russian side will take all measures needed to rebalance the situation and ensure our own security."[https://www.france24.com/en/20170714-ukraine-nato-talks-russia-angry-west-uncertain-relations-tension-poroshenko-putin Ukraine to start NATO talks: Russia angry, the West uncertain], France 24 (16 July 2017)

On 14 September 2020, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy approved Ukraine's new National Security Strategy, "which provides for the development of the distinctive partnership with NATO with the aim of membership in NATO."{{cite news |last=Duggal |first=Hanna |date=25 January 2022 |title=Infographic: Military capabilities of Russia and Ukraine |work=aljazeera.com |publisher=Al Jazeera |url=https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/1/25/infographic-military-capabilities-of-russia-and-ukraine-interactive |access-date=15 February 2022}}{{cite news |date=11 January 2020 |title=Relations with Ukraine |work=NATO |publisher=NATO|url=https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_37750.htm |access-date=15 February 2022 |quote=In September 2020, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy approved Ukraine's new National Security Strategy, which provides for the development of the distinctive partnership with NATO with the aim of membership in NATO.}}{{cite news |last=Getmanchuk |first=Alyona |date=30 September 2020 |title=Russia as aggressor, NATO as objective: Ukraine's new National Security Strategy |work=atlanticcouncil.org |publisher=Atlantic Council |url=https://www.atlanticcouncil.org/blogs/ukrainealert/russia-as-aggressor-nato-as-objective-ukraines-new-national-security-strategy/ |access-date=15 February 2022}}

{{main|Prelude to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine}}

In March and April 2021, the Russian Armed Forces began massing thousands of personnel and military equipment near Russia's border with Ukraine and in Crimea, representing the largest mobilization since the Russian annexation of Crimea in 2014.{{cite news |last1=Holland |first1=Steve |last2=Shalal |first2=Andrea |last3=Landay |first3=Jonathan |others=File photo by Kevin Lamarque |date=8 April 2021|title=Russian force on Ukraine border larger than any time since 2014, U.S. says |work=Reuters |publisher=Thomson Corporation |location=Washington D.C. |editor-last=Paul |editor-first=Franklin |editor2=Dunham, Will |url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-ukraine-crisis-usa-idUSKBN2BV2Z3 |url-access=registration|access-date=8 February 2022}}{{cite news |last=Kramer |first=Andrew E. |others=Article updated 30 April 2021 |date=9 April 2021|title=Russian Troop Movements and Talk of Intervention Cause Jitters in Ukraine |work=The New York Times |location=Moscow |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/09/world/europe/russia-ukraine-war-troops-intervention.html |url-access=subscription |access-date=8 February 2022 |issn=0362-4331 |quote=Russia has amassed more troops on the Ukrainian border than at any time since 2014.}} The troops were partially withdrawn by June 2021.{{cite journal |last=Bielieskov |first=Mykola |date=21 September 2021 |others=Photo by Dimitar Dilkoff |title=The Russian and Ukrainian Spring 2021 War Scare |url=https://www.csis.org/analysis/russian-and-ukrainian-spring-2021-war-scare |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211125015039/https://www.csis.org/analysis/russian-and-ukrainian-spring-2021-war-scare |archive-date=25 November 2021 |access-date=22 January 2022 |website=csis.org |publisher=Center for Strategic and International Studies |quote=Ukrainian estimates provided to the OSCE in June 2021 show that only 12,000 Russian forces were removed from the border, and the rest remain in place.}}

In the essay On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians published on 12 July 2021 on Kremlin.ru Putin argues that Russians and Ukrainians, along with Belarusians, are one people, belonging to what has historically been known as the triune Russian nation.{{cite web|title=Russia and Ukraine: 'One People' as Putin Claims?|first=Andrew|last=Wilson|url=https://rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/commentary/russia-and-ukraine-one-people-putin-claims|date=23 December 2021|access-date=25 January 2022|publisher=RUSI|archive-date=24 January 2022|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220124130721/https://rusi.org/explore-our-research/publications/commentary/russia-and-ukraine-one-people-putin-claims/|url-status=live}}{{Cite web |title=Article by Vladimir Putin "On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians" |url=http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/66181 |access-date=2022-10-16 |website=President of Russia |date=12 July 2021 |language=en}}

Russia again build-up its army presence around Ukraine in October 2021, this time with more soldiers and with deployments on new fronts; by December over 100,000 Russian troops were massed around Ukraine on three sides, including Belarus from the north and Crimea from the south.{{cite news |last1=Troianovski |first1=Anton |author-link1=Anton Troianovski |last2=Sanger |first2=David E. |author-link2=David E. Sanger |others=Photo by Associated Press |date=16 January 2022 |title=Russia Issues Subtle Threats More Far-Reaching Than a Ukraine Invasion |work=The New York Times |location=Vienna |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2022/01/16/world/europe/russia-ukraine-invasion.html |url-access=subscription |access-date=27 January 2022 |issn=0362-4331 |quote=No one expected much progress from this past week's diplomatic marathon to defuse the security crisis Russia has ignited in Eastern Europe by surrounding Ukraine on three sides with 100,000 troops and then, by the White House's accounting, sending in saboteurs to create a pretext for invasion.}} Despite the Russian military build-ups, Russian officials from November 2021 to 20 February 2022 repeatedly denied that Russia had plans to invade Ukraine.{{cite news |last1=Kiely |first1=Eugene |last2=Farley |first2=Robert |title=Russian Rhetoric Ahead of Attack Against Ukraine: Deny, Deflect, Mislead |url=https://www.factcheck.org/2022/02/russian-rhetoric-ahead-of-attack-against-ukraine-deny-deflect-mislead/ |access-date=27 February 2022 |work=FactCheck.org |date=24 February 2022}}{{cite news |last=Taylor |first=Adam |title=Russia's attack on Ukraine came after months of denials it would attack |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/02/24/ukraine-russia-denials/ |access-date=27 February 2022 |newspaper=The Washington Post |date=24 February 2022 |archive-url=https://archive.today/20220224205233/https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/02/24/ukraine-russia-denials/ |archive-date=24 February 2022 |url-status=live }}{{cite news |title=Putin attacked Ukraine after insisting for months there was no plan to do so. Now he says there's no plan to take over. |url=https://www.cbsnews.com/news/russia-ukraine-putin-invasion-after-denials-now-says-no-occupation-plan |access-date=27 February 2022 |work=CBS News |date=24 February 2022}}{{cite news |last=Talmazan |first=Yuliya |title=From buildup to battle: Why Putin stoked a Ukraine crisis — then launched an invasion |url=https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/why-putin-invaded-ukraine-russia-war-explained-rcna16028 |access-date=27 February 2022 |work=NBC News |date=26 February 2022}}

In the first weeks of February 2022 Russia was demanding that NATO would not expand further to the east, Ukraine should be precluded from ever joining NATO, and NATO should significantly scale back its presence and activities in Eastern Europe. Press secretary Peskov stated that Putin showed his readiness to negotiate in his meetings with Western leaders.[https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2022/02/16/ukraine-russia-putin-nato/ U.S. and Russian officials clash over status of troops near Ukraine], Washington Post (16 February 2022)

On 21 February 2022, Russia officially recognised the Donetsk People's Republic and the Luhansk People's Republic.{{Cite news |last=James |first=Liam |date=3 March 2022 |title=Russia claims it has seized Kherson as mayor agrees to conditions to keep city running |work=The Independent |url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russia-ukraine-kherson-take-fall-b2027325.html |access-date=30 September 2022 |archive-date=3 March 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220303125420/https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russia-ukraine-kherson-take-fall-b2027325.html |url-status=live }}; {{Cite web |date=8 April 2022 |title=Berdyansk: Life Under Russian Occupation |url=https://iwpr.net/global-voices/berdyansk-life-under-russian-occupation |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220930204935/https://iwpr.net/global-voices/berdyansk-life-under-russian-occupation |archive-date=30 September 2022 |access-date=30 September 2022 |website=Institute for War and Peace Reporting}}

{{main|2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine}}

File:Kyiv after Russian shelling, 2022-10-10 (073).webp following Russian rocket strikes on 10 October 2022]]

On 24 February 2022, Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine.{{cite news |title=Russia launches massive invasion of Ukraine — live updates |url=https://www.dw.com/en/russia-launches-massive-invasion-of-ukraine-live-updates/a-60893588 |work=Deutsche Welle |date=24 February 2022}} In his televised address announcing the invasion, Putin used the false image of Ukraine as a neo-Nazi state.{{Cite news |date=2022-03-02 |title=Мемориалы жертвам Холокоста осудили действия Путина и его риторику |language=ru |work=BBC News Русская служба |url=https://www.bbc.com/russian/features-60590075 |url-status=live |access-date=2022-03-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220305012902/https://www.bbc.com/russian/features-60590075 |archive-date=2022-03-05}} Putin called the "denazification" of Ukraine one of the goals of the invasion and claimed that "neo-Nazis seized power in Ukraine".{{Cite news |date=2022-02-24 |title=Россия начала "военную операцию" на Украине |language=ru |work=BBC News Русская служба |url=https://www.bbc.com/russian/news-60503311 |url-status=live |access-date=2022-03-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220225003954/https://www.bbc.com/russian/news-60503311 |archive-date=2022-02-25}} Putin also mentioned (to stop eastern) NATO enlargement was one of the reasons for the invasion.{{Cite web |date=2022-02-24 |title=Расшифровка речи Путина о начале военной операции |url=https://paperpaper.ru/putin-obyavil-o-nachale-voennoj-operac/ |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220304190835/https://paperpaper.ru/putin-obyavil-o-nachale-voennoj-operac/ |archive-date=2022-03-04 |access-date=2022-03-07 |website=Бумага |language=ru}}{{Cite news |date=2022-02-24 |title='No other option': Excerpts of Putin's speech declaring war |language=en |work=Al Jazeera |url=https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/24/putins-speech-declaring-war-on-ukraine-translated-excerpts |url-status=live |access-date=2022-03-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220301132642/https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/24/putins-speech-declaring-war-on-ukraine-translated-excerpts |archive-date=2022-03-01}} Addressing the citizens of Ukraine, he linked Russia's actions with self-defense against the threats created for it and "an even greater disaster than the one that is happening today", saying: "No matter how hard it is, I ask you to understand this and call for interaction in order to turn this tragic page and move forward together."{{Cite news |date=2022-02-24 |title=Путин объявил о начале военной операции на Украине |language=ru |work=ТАСС |url=https://tass.ru/politika/13825671 |url-status=live |access-date=2022-03-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220224045055/https://tass.ru/politika/13825671 |archive-date=2022-02-24}} Putin claimed there were no plans to occupy Ukrainian territory and that he supported the right of the peoples of Ukraine to self-determination{{#tag:ref|In a televised meeting with military bloggers on 13 June 2023 Putin stated Russia respects those who in Ukraine "want to feel like a Ukrainian."|group=nb}}, saying: "Our plans do not include the occupation of Ukrainian territories. We are not going to impose anything on anyone by force. At the same time, we hear that recently in the West there is talk that the documents signed by the Soviet totalitarian regime, securing the outcome of World War II, should no longer be upheld." Putin claimed Russia was carrying out a special military operation in order to protect people in Donbas "who have been suffering from abuse and genocide by the Kiev regime for eight years." According to Putin the objective of the invasion where the demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine.{{Cite web |title=Ukraine's boats attack ships evacuating Ukrainian troops who surrendered on Snake Island|url=https://tass.com/russia/1412053|access-date=2022-12-25 |website=TASS news agency|date=2022-02-28|language=English}} Meanwhile the Russian Ministry of Defence assured that its troops were not targeting Ukrainian cities, but that its actions were limited to surgically striking and incapacitating Ukrainian military infrastructure. The ministry claimed that there were no threats whatsoever to the civilian population.

At a meeting of the Security Council of Russia on 25 February, he called the Ukrainian authorities "a gang of drug addicts and neo-Nazis".{{Cite news |date=2022-02-25 |title=Военная операция на Украине. Главное |language=ru |work=РБК |url=https://www.rbc.ru/politics/25/02/2022/62074b119a7947b0e49b36f7 |access-date=2022-03-07 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20220225195724/https://www.rbc.ru/politics/25/02/2022/62074b119a7947b0e49b36f7 |archive-date=2022-02-25}}

In a televised meeting with military bloggers on 13 June 2023 Putin claimed that Russia and Ukraine had in March 2022 in Istanbul came to "a good agreement on how to resolve the current situation by peaceful means" but that the Ukrainians had "threw it away" after the withdrawal of Russian troops from Kyiv after the (failed) Russian 2022 offensive on Kyiv.{{cite web |title=Putin called "not bad" the agreement reached in March 2022 between Russia and Ukraine|url=https://tass.ru/politika/17997587|website=TASS|date=13 June 2023|access-date=13 June 2023|language=Russian}}
{{cite web |title=The President of the Russian Federation clarified that during the 2022 negotiations between the Russian and Ukrainian sides, Moscow regularly raised the issue that Kyiv supports the neo-Nazi movement|url=https://tass.ru/politika/179967137|website=TASS|date=13 June 2023|access-date=13 June 2023|language=Russian}} According to Putin Ukraine had agreed to curb Neo-Nazism in Ukraine through the "introducing appropriate restrictions in the law in Ukraine", but this had failed to happen intentionally. On 14 June 2024 Putin claimed that "Russian troops were near Kyiv in March 2022", but "There was no political decision to storm the three-million-strong city; it was a coercive operation to establish peace."{{cite news |title=Putin claims he did not plan to storm Kyiv in 2022|url=https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2024/06/14/7460780/|access-date=14 June 2024|work=Ukrainska Pravda|date=14 June 2024|language=English}}

On 17 June 2022 Putin stated at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum that Russian was not against Ukraine joining the EU, "because it is not a military organization, a military-political bloc, such as NATO."{{cite news |title=Russia's Foreign Ministry says conditions for peace include Ukraine recognizing 'new territorial realities' and Russian as state language|url=https://meduza.io/en/news/2023/05/27/russia-s-foreign-ministry-says-conditions-for-peace-include-ukraine-recognizing-new-territorial-realities-and-russian-as-state-language|work=Meduza|date=27 May 2023|access-date=27 May 2023|language=English}}
{{cite news |title=Russia is not against Ukraine's accession to the European Union, Putin said|url=https://ria.ru/20220617/evrosoyuz-1796284100.html|work=RIA Novosti|date=17 June 2022|access-date=27 May 2023|language=Russian}}

File:Vladimir Saldo, Yevgeny Balitsky, Vladimir Putin, Denis Pushilin and Leonid Pasechnik (2022-09-30 17-03-30).png, Yevgeny Balitsky, Denis Pushilin and Leonid Pasechnik following the annexation of these territories on 30 September 2022]]

On 21 September 2022, Putin announced a "partial" mobilization.{{cite news |title=Putin orders partial Russian mobilisation, warns West over 'nuclear blackmail' |url=https://www.euractiv.com/section/global-europe/news/putin-orders-partial-russian-mobilisation-warns-west-over-nuclear-blackmail/ |work=Euractiv |date=21 September 2022}}

On 30 September 2022, amid the ongoing invasion of Ukraine, Russia unilaterally declared its annexation of areas in and around four Ukrainian regions — Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson — despite only partially occupying the regions and gradually losing control as a result of successful Ukrainian counteroffensives in the south and east.{{Cite news |last=Dickson |first=Janice |date=30 September 2022 |title=Putin signs documents to illegally annex four Ukrainian regions, in drastic escalation of Russia's war |work=The Globe and Mail |url=https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/article-putin-signs-documents-to-unlawfully-claim-4-ukrainian-regions-in/ |url-status=live |access-date=1 October 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221001031159/https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/article-putin-signs-documents-to-unlawfully-claim-4-ukrainian-regions-in/ |archive-date=1 October 2022|quote=Mr. Putin's claim to more than 15 per cent of Ukraine's territory is the largest annexation in Europe since the Second World War.}} In his speech following the formal signing of the annexation Putin denounced the 1991 Belovezh Accords that formally ended the Soviet Union while also claiming "There is no Soviet Union, the past cannot be brought back. And Russia today does not need it any more. We are not striving for this."{{Cite web |title=Putin's speech on annexation: What exactly did he say? |url=https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/30/russia-ukraine-war-putins-annexation-speech-what-did-he-say |access-date=2022-10-01 |website=www.aljazeera.com |language=en |archive-date=18 October 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221018130648/https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/9/30/russia-ukraine-war-putins-annexation-speech-what-did-he-say |url-status=live }}{{cite news|title=Document proclaiming death of Soviet Union missing|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/russia/9854619/Document-proclaiming-death-of-Soviet-Union-missing.html | location=London | work=The Daily Telegraph|date=7 February 2013}}

On 10 October 2022 at a meeting with the Security Council of Russia, on the first day of the months long Russian attack against Ukrainian infrastructure, Putin said the missile strikes were in retaliation for the alleged Ukrainian attack on the Crimean Bridge, which he called an act of "terrorism",{{Cite news |title=Biden condemns Ukraine attack as Putin claims it's retaliation for terrorism |url=https://www.axios.com/2022/10/10/putin-strikes-retaliation-crimea-bridge-attack |work=Axios |date=10 October 2022 |access-date=10 October 2022 |archive-date=10 October 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221010193941/https://www.axios.com/2022/10/10/putin-strikes-retaliation-crimea-bridge-attack |url-status=live }} adding that if such attacks continued, the response would be "severe".{{Cite news |title=Putin says response to more Ukrainian attacks will be 'severe' |url=https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/10/10/putin-says-response-to-more-ukrainian-attacks-will-be-severe |work=Al Jazeera |date=10 October 2022 |access-date=10 October 2022 |archive-date=10 October 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221010175936/https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/10/10/putin-says-response-to-more-ukrainian-attacks-will-be-severe |url-status=live }}{{Cite news |title='Sickening': World reacts as explosions rock Ukrainian cities |url=https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/10/10/world-reacts-to-new-russian-missile-strikes-on-ukrainian-cities |work=Al Jazeera |date=10 October 2022 |access-date=10 October 2022 |archive-date=10 October 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221010180241/https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/10/10/world-reacts-to-new-russian-missile-strikes-on-ukrainian-cities |url-status=live }}

File:Первых призывников из Ялты проводили на службу, 2022, 05.jpg drafted into the Russian army during the 2022 Russian mobilization]]

On 21 December 2022 Putin stated a clash with "hostile forces" in Ukraine had been inevitable and "because it's inevitable, better today than tomorrow."[https://tass.com/politics/1554009 Putin says it was obvious that clash with hostile forces in Ukraine was inevitable], TASS news agency (21 December 2022) The following day Putin told reporters that Russia's goal was "to end this war, we are striving for this and will continue to strive."{{Cite web |title=Putin announced Moscow's desire to end the conflict in Ukraine as soon as possible|url=https://www.interfax.ru/russia/878285|access-date=2022-12-22 |website=Interfax|date=2022-12-22|language=Russian}}
{{Cite web |title=Putin: 'Our aim is to end this war'|url=https://meduza.io/en/news/2022/12/22/putin-our-aim-is-to-end-this-war|access-date=2022-12-22 |website=Meduza|date=2022-12-22|language=English}}

In an interview on 25 December 2022 Putin stated that Russia since 2014 tried to resolve the situation in Ukraine peacefully, but that "what underlies everything is the policy of our geopolitical opponents that's aimed at breaking up Russia, the historical Russia."{{Cite web |title=Putin says West's attempts to break up historical Russia underlie conflict in Ukraine|url=https://tass.com/politics/1555653|access-date=2022-12-25 |website=TASS news agency|date=2022-12-25|language=English}} Putin also stated that Russia was ready to "hold talks on the situation around Ukraine and is ready to engage with everyone involved."{{Cite web |title=Putin says Russia, unlike its opponents, doesn't refuse talks on Ukraine|url=https://tass.com/politics/1555655|access-date=2022-12-25 |website=TASS news agency|date=2022-12-25|language=English}} In the interview Putin avowed that Russia couldn't treat Ukraine cynically, as allegedly "the West" did, because "We have a different philosophy, different approach to life, people."{{Cite web |title=Putin says Russia couldn't treat Ukraine cynically, as West did|url=https://tass.com/politics/1555657|access-date=2022-12-25 |website=TASS news agency|date=2022-12-25|language=English}}

On 28 December 2022 Putin's press secretary Dmitry Peskov stated that "no Ukrainian 'peace plan' is possible if it does not take into account the modern reality - with Russia's territory, with four new regions joining Russia."{{Cite web |title=Ukraine 'peace plan' must factor in Russia's four new regions, Kremlin emphasizes|url=https://tass.com/politics/1556743|access-date=2022-12-28|website=TASS news agency|date=2022-12-28|language=English}}

In a phone conversation with President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on 5 January 2023 Putin repeated this demand stating he "reaffirmed Russia's openness to a serious dialogue, provided that the Kiev authorities fulfill the well–known and repeatedly voiced requirements and take into account the new territorial realities."{{Cite web |title=Putin tells Erdogan: Ukraine must accept loss of territories for there to be dialogue|url=https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/putin-tells-erdogan-ukraine-must-accept-loss-territories-there-be-dialogue-2023-01-05/|date=2023-01-05|access-date=2023-01-05|website=Reuters|language=English}}{{Cite web |title=Erdogan Tells Putin a Cease-Fire Should Support Ukraine Peace Efforts|url=https://www.voanews.com/a/erdogan-tells-putin-a-cease-fire-should-support-ukraine-peace-efforts/6905296.html|date=2023-01-05|access-date=2023-01-05|website=Voice of America|language=English}}

In his 2023 new year speech Putin claimed that "Western elites" had hypocritically assured Russia of their peaceful intentions, including the settlement of the conflict in the Donbas, but Putin alleged that in reality they had "in every possible way encouraged the neo-Nazis ... And today it is openly admitting this, no longer embarrassed. They are cynically using Ukraine and its people to weaken and split Russia."{{Cite web |title=Putin's New Year address: Year of major steps and fight for Russia's future|url=https://tass.com/society/1558293|access-date=2022-12-31|website=TASS news agency|date=2022-12-31|language=English}} Putin also stated that "Russian servicemen, militias, volunteers are now fighting for their native land, for truth and justice. For guarantees of peace and security for Russia to be reliably provided. All of them are our heroes, it is the hardest time for them now".

At a UN Security Council meeting of 14 January 2023 Permanent Representative of Russia to the United Nations Vasily Nebenzya stated that "only when the threat for Russia no longer emanates from the territory of Ukraine and when the discrimination against the Russian-speaking population of this country ends" it could stop its military actions.{{cite web |title=Russia reiterates its readiness to negotiate at UN, but with conditions|url=https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/01/14/7384833/|website=Ukrainska Pravda|date=14 January 2023|access-date=14 January 2023|language=English}} Nebenzya continued that "Otherwise, Moscow will get what it wants militarily". Nebenzya further claimed that Russia does not want "the destruction of Ukraine as a state, its de-Ukrainianisation and forced Russification''.

In an interview on broadcast on 15 January 2023 on Russia-1 TV channel Putin stated about the military invasion of Ukraine that "The dynamics are positive. Everything is developing within the plan of the Defense Ministry and the General Staff. And I hope that our fighters will please us more than once again with the results of their combat work."{{Cite web |title=Dynamics of special op are positive, everything is going according to plan — Putin|url=https://tass.com/politics/1562437|access-date=2023-01-15|website=TASS news agency|date=2023-01-15|language=English}}

File:Vladimir Putin visited the Headquarters of the Dnepr Group of Forces and Vostok National Guard Headquarters (2023) 01.png Oleg Makarevich on 17 April 2023 during Putin's visit to Russian army troops in Kherson Oblast]]

In his 21 February 2023 address to the joint houses of the Russian parliament Putin stated that "We are not at war with the people of Ukraine. They've become hostages of their own regime and its Western masters."{{cite web |title=Mr. Putin, the mic is yours For the first time in almost two years, Russia's president addressed both houses of Parliament in a major speech on the state of the Federation|url=https://meduza.io/en/live/2023/02/21/mr-putin-the-mic-is-yours|website=Meduza|date=21 February 2023|access-date=21 February 2023|language=English}} In the speech Putin claimed that "The West began remaking Ukraine into an anti-Russia in order to tear away these historical lands from our country." In the speech Putin alleged that there was a plan prepared by Kyiv and "the West" to launch a "punitive operation" in the Donbas just before Russia intervened. Putin also remarked that the war was about Russia's right to exist.{{cite web |title=Biden and Putin both implicitly tie their futures to the outcome in Ukraine|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/feb/21/biden-and-putin-both-implicitly-tie-their-futures-to-the-outcome-in-ukraine|website=The Guardian|date=21 February 2023|access-date=21 February 2023|language=English}}

During a meeting with Valery Zorkin, the chairman of the Constitutional Court of Russia, while discussing a mid-17th century French map stated about Ukraine: "These lands were simply part of the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, and then they were asked to become part of the Kingdom of Muscovy… And it was only later, after the October Revolution, that quasi-state formations began to form. The Soviet government created Soviet Ukraine. There was never any Ukraine in the history of humanity up to that point."{{cite news |title=Putin decides to show off his "knowledge of history" again with "map with no Ukraine"|url=https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/05/23/7403543/|work=Ukrainska Pravda|date=23 May 2023|access-date=23 May 2023|language=English}}

On 30 May 2023 Putin stated that Russia did strike the territory of Ukraine, but did so "with high-accuracy long-range weapons and targets precisely military infrastructure facilities, or warehouses with ammunition or fuel and lubricants used in combat operations."{{Cite web|title=IN BRIEF: Kiev tries to scare Russians, trigger response — Putin about UAV attack|url=https://tass.com/politics/1625317|website=TASS|date=2023-05-30|access-date=2023-05-30|language=English}} The strikes in reality targeted civilian areas beyond the battlefield, particularly critical power infrastructure,{{Cite news |url=https://www.ft.com/content/24da8f9c-e27b-4522-a520-d2d29f8f2469 |title=Vladimir Putin says Russia launched strikes on Ukraine over Crimea bridge explosion |last1=Olearchyk |first1=Roman |last2=Srivastava |first2=Mehul |last3=Seddon |first3=Max |last4=Miller |first4=Christopher |newspaper=Financial Times |url-access=subscription |date=10 October 2022 |access-date=10 October 2022 |archive-date=10 October 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221010074344/https://www.ft.com/content/24da8f9c-e27b-4522-a520-d2d29f8f2469 |url-status=live }}{{cite web |url=https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/10/1129387 |title=Ukraine: Russian large-scale strikes are 'unacceptable escalation', says Guterres |date=10 October 2022 |access-date=11 October 2022 |archive-date=10 October 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221010201831/https://news.un.org/en/story/2022/10/1129387 |url-status=live }} which is considered a war crime.{{cite web |date=2022-10-11 |title=Zelenskiy asks G7 for monitoring of Ukraine's border with Belarus |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/oct/11/russia-accused-of-war-crimes-as-it-continues-to-hit-ukraine-infrastructure |access-date=2022-12-06 |website=the Guardian |language=en |archive-date=21 October 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221021195146/https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/oct/11/russia-accused-of-war-crimes-as-it-continues-to-hit-ukraine-infrastructure |url-status=live }}{{cite web |url=https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2022/10/ukraine-russian-attacks-on-critical-energy-infrastructure-amount-to-war-crimes/ |title=Ukraine: Russian attacks on critical energy infrastructure amount to war crimes |date=20 October 2022 |publisher=Amnesty International |access-date=17 December 2022 |archive-date=16 December 2022 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20221216131209/https://www.amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2022/10/ukraine-russian-attacks-on-critical-energy-infrastructure-amount-to-war-crimes/ |url-status=live }}

In a televised meeting with military bloggers on 13 June 2023 Putin stated that he did not believe that there was a need for further mobilisation in Russia since he ruled out a repeat of the (failed) Russian 2022 Kyiv offensive.{{cite web |title=Putin denies Zelenskiy's claims of counteroffensive success for Ukraine|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/jun/13/putin-denies-zelenskiys-claims-counteroffensive-success-ukraine-russia|website=The Guardian|date=13 June 2023|access-date=13 June 2023|language=English}} He also told the bloggers that "On the whole, there are no fundamental changes as of today regarding the objectives that we had outlined at the beginning of the operation. There are no changes."{{cite web |title=Russia to accomplish all set objectives of special military operation — Putin|url=https://tass.com/politics/1631601|website=TASS|date=13 June 2023|access-date=13 June 2023|language=English}} Putin also claimed that conscript soldiers would not be sent "to the zone of the special military operation", including to the "new regions of Russia" (the annexed Ukrainian regions Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson).{{cite web |title=The counteroffensive of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, the "sanitary zone" in Ukraine and the goals of the NWO. What did Putin say to the military?|url=https://tass.ru/armiya-i-opk/18000647|website=TASS|date=13 June 2023|access-date=13 June 2023|language=Russian}} Putin also claimed that because Ukraine had denounced the 1922 Declaration of the Creation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics "Ukraine should have left the Soviet Union (USSR) with what it came with" but in "But in 1645 or 1654 there was no Ukraine.”{{cite web |title=Putin agreed with Sobchak's words that Ukraine had to leave the USSR "with what it came"|url=https://tass.ru/politika/17998547|website=TASS|date=13 June 2023|access-date=13 June 2023|language=Russian}} According to Putin Vladimir Lenin had founded Ukraine in 1922.{{cite web |title=Putin noted that "grateful descendants" in Ukraine are demolishing monuments to its founder Lenin|url=https://tass.ru/politika/18000563|website=TASS|date=13 June 2023|access-date=13 June 2023|language=Russian}} Putin had concluded from studying archival documents "on the transfer of Donbass from Russia" and had concluded that it "was not based on discussions with the population, but was based only on Lenin's decision." Putin also stated that Ukraine "whatever it is, it exists, and we must treat it with respect" but that it should not exist at the expense of Russia and that "If they want to live in our historical territories, then you need to influence on their political leadership in such a way as to build normal relations with Russia, so that no one from these territories threatens us."{{cite web |title=Putin: Ukraine should not exist at the expense of the Russian Federation and in the historical Russian territories|url=https://tass.ru/politika/17998503|website=TASS|date=13 June 2023|access-date=13 June 2023|language=Russian}} Putin also told the bloggers "we can't just leave Crimea - we can't, it's impossible. This would be a betrayal on our part." Putin also claimed that Russia would continue to "selectively strike targets in Ukraine", and not hit residential areas, "like these idiots."{{cite web |title=Putin assured that Russia will continue to selectively strike targets in Ukraine|url=https://tass.ru/politika/17998433|website=TASS|date=13 June 2023|access-date=13 June 2023|language=Russian}}

At a plenary meeting of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum Putin stated on 13 June 2023 that "Russia has every right to consider the denazification of Ukraine one of the main goals."{{cite web |title=Putin speaks of "denazification" of Ukraine and calls Zelenskyy "a disgrace to Jewish people"|url=https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/06/16/7407195/|website=Ukrainska Pravda|date=16 June 2023|access-date=16 June 2023|language=English}} According to Putin this had to be so because he believed "today's Ukrainian authorities" protected "as individuals and their ideology" Banderites (a faction of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists in World War II{{cite book|title=Encyclopedia of Nationalism|volume=Two-Volume Set|publisher=Elsevier, Academic Press|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=pvHRNNk9hHEC&pg=PA40|year=2000|page=40|isbn=0080545246|first=Alexander J|last=Motyl|id=With over one hundred contributors|quote=On February 10, 1941, Bandera called a conference of radicals in Kraków, Poland. The conference refused to accept Melnyk as leader, and named Bandera head of the OUN. This led to the split of the OUN in the spring of 1941 into two groups: OUN-B (Banderites), who were more militant, younger and supported Bandera, and OUN-M (Melnykites), who were generally older, more ideological.}}). At the conference Putin also claimed that “many lifelong Jewish friends” had told him that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy “isn’t Jewish but a disgrace to the Jewish people.”{{cite web |title=Putin says Zelensky 'isn't Jewish but a disgrace to the Jewish people'|url=https://meduza.io/en/news/2023/06/16/putin-says-zelensky-isn-t-jewish-but-a-disgrace-to-the-jewish-people|date=5 September 2023|access-date=6 September 2023|lang=English|website=Meduza}} Zelenskyy was born to Jewish parents.{{Cite news |last=Higgins |first=Andrew |date=24 April 2019 |title=Ukraine's Newly Elected President Is Jewish. So Is Its Prime Minister. Not All Jews There Are Pleased. |work=The New York Times |url=https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/24/world/europe/volodomyr-zelensky-ukraine-jewish-president.html |url-status=live |access-date=25 April 2019 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190425012514/https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/24/world/europe/volodomyr-zelensky-ukraine-jewish-president.html |archive-date=25 April 2019 |issn=0362-4331}}
{{cite news |last1=Liphshiz |first1=Cnaan |date=19 March 2019 |title=Jewish comic who plays Ukraine president on TV leads Ukraine's presidential race |url=https://www.timesofisrael.com/jewish-comic-who-plays-ukraine-president-on-tv-leads-ukraines-presidential-race/ |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190331233031/https://www.timesofisrael.com/jewish-comic-who-plays-ukraine-president-on-tv-leads-ukraines-presidential-race/ |archive-date=31 March 2019 |url-status=live |work=The Times of Israel |oclc=969749342 }}
{{cite web |title=ethnic Ukrainian father's farer's medal certificate |url=http://podvignaroda.ru/filter/filterimage?path=VS/245/033-0690155-1047%2b011-1046/00000509.jpg |url-status=live |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200611065402/http://podvignaroda.ru/filter/filterimage?path=VS%2F245%2F033-0690155-1047%2B011-1046%2F00000509.jpg |archive-date=11 June 2020 |access-date=12 October 2019 |language=ru}}
{{cite web |url=https://file.liga.net/persons/vladimir-zelenskii |script-title=ru:Зеленский Владимир {{!}} Руководитель проекта "Квартал-95" |trans-title=Zelensky Vladimir {{!}} Project manager "Kvartal-95" |date=5 June 2018 |orig-date=28 October 2011 |website=Ligamedia |language=ru |access-date=10 March 2022 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190102050545/https://file.liga.net/persons/vladimir-zelenskii |archive-date=2 January 2019 }}

In an interview aired 5 September 2023 (with {{ill|Pavel Zarubin|he|פאבל זארובין}}) Putin claimed, referring to Ukrainian President Zelenskyy, that “Western managers put an ethnic Jew in charge of Ukraine.” According to Putin “This makes for an extremely disgusting situation in which an ethnic Jew is covering up the glorification of Nazism and of those who led the Holocaust in Ukraine, which brought the destruction of 1.5 million of people.”{{cite web |title='Even the SS troops didn't consider it possible' Putin says 'local nationalists and anti-Semites' killed 1.5 million Jews in Ukraine during WWII|url=https://meduza.io/en/feature/2023/09/05/even-the-ss-troops-didn-t-consider-it-possible|date=5 September 2023|access-date=7 September 2023|lang=English|website=Meduza}}
{{cite web |title=Ukraine war live: Nine hundred people killed or injured by Russian cluster bombs in Ukraine, says monitor; Zelenskiy visits Bakhmut – as it happened|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2023/sep/05/russia-ukraine-war-live-updates-drone-attack-moscow-suburbs-putin-kim-jong-un-latest-news?page=with:block-64f744eb8f086d013616b524#block-64f744eb8f086d013616b524|date=5 September 2023|access-date=5 September 2023|lang=English|website=The Guardian}}
{{cite web |title=Putin says 'Western managers put an ethnic Jew in charge of Ukraine' to mask its 'anti-human nature'|url=https://meduza.io/en/news/2023/09/05/putin-says-western-curators-put-an-ethnic-jew-in-charge-of-ukraine-to-mask-its-anti-human-nature|date=5 September 2023|access-date=5 September 2023|lang=English|website=Meduza}}{{#tag:ref|Contemporary estimates about the number of Jews killed in the whole Soviet Union (that included the Ukrainian SSR) range from Timothy D. Snyder's estimate that at least 1.7 million Jews killed to Yad Vashem's estimate that between 1 and 1.1 million Jews were killed.{{Cite web|url=http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2009/jul/16/holocaust-the-ignored-reality/|title=Holocaust: The Ignored Reality|last=Timothy Snyder|date=16 July 2009|publisher=The New York Review of Books|format=Internet Archive|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140109073643/http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2009/jul/16/holocaust-the-ignored-reality/|archive-date=January 9, 2014|access-date=7 September 2023|url-status=dead}}
{{cite journal |last1=|first1=|title=Questions and answers about the Holocaust (#4) |journal=Yad Vashem |url=https://www.yadvashem.org/he/holocaust/faqs.html |language=he|access-date=7 September 2023}}|group=nb}}

File:Владимир Путин на заседании МДК "Валдай" (2023).jpg of 5 October 2023]]

In a speech and a Q&A session on 5 October 2023 at the annual meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club Putin stated “We did not start the so-called war in Ukraine. On the contrary, we are trying to end it. We did not stage a coup in Kiev.”{{cite web |url=https://meduza.io/en/feature/2023/10/06/from-the-new-world-order-to-coke-and-hand-grenades|title=From the New World Order to coke and hand grenades Here's what Putin said at Russia's annual Valdai Discussion Club|date=6 October 2023|access-date=6 October 2023|publisher=Meduza|language=English}}
{{cite web |url=https://ria.ru/20231005/putin-1900586407.html|title=Key points from Putin's speech at the Valdai Forum|date=5 October 2023|access-date=5 October 2023|publisher=RIA Novosti|language=Russian}}
{{cite web |url=https://ria.ru/20231005/odessa-1900777535.html?in=t|title=Putin called Odesa a Russian city|date=5 October 2023|access-date=5 October 2023|publisher=RIA Novosti|language=Russian}} Putin claimed the war was started by "the Kiev regime with the direct support of the West" and that "the special military operation is aimed at stopping it. He went on to claim "The Ukrainian crisis is not a territorial conflict. Russia is the largest country in terms of territory in the world.” According to him "the meaning of our actions in Ukraine" was that "civilization is not territory, but people." Putin also stated that Odesa "of course" is "a Russian city, but it’s a bit Jewish. Just a tiny bit.” and that the city could "become both a bone of discord and a symbol of conflict resolution." Putin also claimed that the standing ovations Yaroslav Hunka (although at the moment Zelenskyy was unaware of Hunka's past membership of the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the Waffen-SS{{cite news |last=Burke |first=Ashley |date=30 September 2023 |title=Family of man who fought in Nazi unit unaware Hunka would be honoured in Parliament, friend says |url=https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/friend-hunka-family-north-bay-parliament-political-controversy-1.6983517 |work=CBC News |access-date=30 September 2023 |archive-date=30 September 2023 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20230930185305/https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/friend-hunka-family-north-bay-parliament-political-controversy-1.6983517 |url-status=live}}) received from President Zelenskyy (on 22 September 2023 in the) Canadian parliament) was "a sign of the Nazification of Ukraine" and "This is precisely why it is necessary to denazify Ukraine. Putin also assured the audience that "we have never been against" Ukrainian EU membership, but that Ukrainian NATO-membership "we have always been against it, since it threatens our security."

At a meeting with the Civic Chamber of the Russian Federation on 3 November 2023 Putin stated that in the 16th century Ukraine had "consisted of three oblasts: the city of Kyiv and the oblasts of Kyiv, Zhytomyr and Chernihiv. According to Putin "The Soviet Union was formed and a vast Ukraine was formed, first and foremost, to a significant extent, at the expense of the southern Russian lands - the entire Black Sea region and so on - although all of these cities, as you know, were founded by Catherine the Great after a series of wars with Turkey, the Ottoman Empire." Putin claimed that modern Russia had "come to terms with" the loss of Ukraine after the collapse of the USSR, but "when they started destroying everything of Russian origin there, that was obviously unacceptable! And they ended up declaring that Russians are not indigenous to these lands – well, this is complete nonsense. And at the same time, they began to exterminate Russians in Donbas." Putin stated that "If everything had been fine in Ukraine, if Russian people, the Russian language and Russian culture had been treated normally, and if there had not been those coups d'état" the 2014 Russian annexation of Crimea and Russo-Ukrainian War would not have taken place but they had to take place "to protect people from this Nazi abomination".{{cite web |url=https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/11/3/7427096/|title=Putin reiterates that Ukraine never existed and he was forced to start war|date=3 November 2023|access-date=3 November 2023|publisher=Ukrainska Pravda}}

In the December 2023 Direct Line with Vladimir Putin Putin stated “there will only be peace in Ukraine when we achieve our aims”; those "objectives do not change", he said, listing "denazification, demilitarisation and its neutral status".{{cite web |url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2023/dec/14/vladimir-putin-peace-russia-ukraine-president|title=Putin says no peace until Russia's goals in Ukraine achieved|date=14 December 2023|access-date=15 December 2023|work=The Guardian}}
{{cite web |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-67711802|title=Russia-Ukraine war: Putin tells Russia his war objectives are unchanged|date=14 December 2023|access-date=15 December 2023|publisher=BBC News}} He claimed that Ukrainian far-right leader of the radical militant wing of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (during World War II) Stepan Bandera was Ukraine’s “national hero” and brought up again the 98-year-old SS veteran Hunka.{{cite web |url=https://meduza.io/en/live/2023/12/14/putin-and-the-people|title=Putin and the people The Kremlin stages its end-of-the-year marathon press conference, combined with a televised call-in show, to showcase Russia's presidency|date=14 December 2023|access-date=15 December 2023|publisher=Meduza}} He stated there would be no reprise of the 2022 Russian mobilization stating "Why do we need a mobilization? There is no need.”{{cite web |url=https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2023/12/15/world/politics/putin-ukraine-war-confidence/|title=Vladimir Putin exudes confidence that war in Ukraine is going his way|date=15 December 2023|access-date=15 December 2023|publisher=The Japan Times}} Putin claimed again that "Russians and Ukrainians are one people, and what’s happening right now is a tragedy" and reiterated that "All of southeastern Ukraine was in favor of Russia because these are historically Russian territories. What does Ukraine have to do with anything? Odesa is a Russian city — everybody knows that. They’ve made up a bunch of historical nonsense." About the September 2022 Russian annexed territories of Ukraine Putin said that a budget allocated more than a trillion rubles ($11.15 billion) annually for the development of these (in his words) “new regions” and their “integration into the economic and social life” of Russia; he stated that "Of course, in Russia’s other regions, the situation is fundamentally better, because the authorities in Kyiv “did not give these regions the attention they were due.”

Talking to journalists in Tashkent (Uzbekistan) Putin claimed that since Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy’s five-year term had come to an end and Ukraine had not hold presidential elections Zelenskyy’s presidential powers should have been transferred to the speaker of the parliament Ruslan Stefanchuk. Putin referred to Art. 111 of the Constitution of Ukraine to back up his claim.{{cite news |title=Putin says Ukraine's parliamentary speaker is now de facto country leader|url=https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2024/05/28/7458044/|access-date=28 May 2024|work=Ukrainska Pravda|date=28 May 2024|language=English}}{{#tag:ref|It is likely that Putin meant to refer to Art. 112 of the Constitution of Ukraine that does mention "In the event of the pre-term termination of authority of the President of Ukraine... [his/her powers] shall be vested in the Chairperson of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine" (speaker of the parliament); Art. 111 does not mention the speaker of the parliament.|group=nb}} Putin said that this was his "preliminary assessment" and that an "in-depth analysis is needed." The same day Stefanchuk responded on on social media "It’s great that the Constitution of Ukraine is now read in russia", and he recommended "that inquisitive readers refrain from selective reading of the text of our Constitution and pay attention to Art. 108.1: ‘The President of Ukraine shall exercise his powers until the newly elected President of Ukraine takes office.’"{{cite news |title=Ukraine's parliamentary speaker Stefanchuk responds to Putin's claim that Stefanchuk now holds presidential power|url=https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2024/05/28/7458066/|access-date=28 May 2024|work=Ukrainska Pravda|date=28 May 2024|language=English}}

File:Destructions in Ternopil after Russian attack, 2024-12-02 (01).webp after a Russian drone attack on 2 December 2024]]

At a speech at the Russian Foreign Ministry on 14 June 2024 Putin put forward his "conditions for ending hostilities in Ukraine." He stated that Ukraine had to "begin the actual withdrawal of troops from the territories of Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia oblasts within the administrative borders." These borders had to be "as they existed at the time of their accession to Ukraine."{{#tag:ref|On 14 June 2024 Russia was not holding all these territories Putin mentioned under its military control.|group=nb}} Additionally, Ukraine had to "officially announces the abandonment of plans to join NATO." After these conditions had been met "from our side, immediately, literally at that same moment, the order to cease fire and begin negotiations will be issued. I repeat, we will do this immediately." He claimed that the essence of this Russian proposal "is not about a temporary truce. It is not about freezing the conflict but about its final resolution." Putin listed Ukraine’s neutral and non-nuclear status and lifting sanctions against Russia as additional conditions for peaceful resolution. Putin also declared that in future peace negotiations Russia would insist on the "demilitarization and denazification" of Ukraine whose according to Putin "parameters were generally agreed upon by everyone back during the Istanbul talks in 2022. Putin also mentioned "Of course, the rights and freedoms of Russian-speaking citizens in Ukraine must be fully ensured."{{cite news |title=Russia makes another real peace proposal to Kiev — Putin|url=https://tass.com/politics/1803657|access-date=15 June 2024|work=TASS|date=14 June 2024|language=English}} Putin stated that this plan was "another real concrete peace proposal", and if turned down by Ukraine and its allies, "then this is their problem, their political and moral responsibility for continuing the bloodshed".{{cite news |title=Putin lays out his terms for ceasefire in Ukraine|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c033eyyr20do|access-date=14 June 2024|work=BBC News|date=14 June 2024|language=English}}
{{cite news |title=Vladimir Putin issues fresh demands to Ukraine to end war|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/article/2024/jun/14/vladimir-putin-issues-fresh-demands-to-ukraine-to-end-war|access-date=14 June 2024|work=The Guardian|date=14 June 2024|language=English}}
{{cite news |title=Putin states Ukrainian Armed Forces must withdraw from 4 Ukrainian oblasts to begin peace talks|url=https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2024/06/14/7460781/|access-date=14 June 2024|work=Ukrainska Pravda|date=14 June 2024|language=English}} Putin also stated in the speech that “We would like such decisions — regarding the withdrawal of troops, non-aligned status, and starting a dialogue with Russia, on which the future existence of Ukraine depends — to be made independently in Kyiv, guided by the genuine national interests of the Ukrainian people. Not at the behest of the West. Although there are significant doubts about this.”{{cite news |title=Putin names Russia's conditions for ceasefire in Ukraine|url=https://meduza.io/en/news/2024/06/14/putin-names-russia-s-conditions-for-ceasefire-in-ukraine|access-date=14 June 2024|work=Meduza|date=14 June 2024|language=English}} Later that day, President Zelenskyy told Sky TG24 television: "These messages are ultimatum messages. It's the same thing Hitler did, when he said 'give me a part of Czechoslovakia and it'll end here'."

{{See also|Peace negotiations in the Russian invasion of Ukraine#February 2025}}

File:Secretary Rubio Holds a Meeting with Saudi Arabia and Russia (54334316072).jpg on 18 February 2025]]

In an interview aired 24 February 2025 (with All-Russia State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company journalist {{ill|Pavel Zarubin|he|פאבל זארובין}}) Putin claimed that Russia and the United States wanted to achieve peace in Ukraine as soon as possible.{{Cite web|title=Ukraine, projects with US: Putin's statements after meeting on rare earths|url=https://tass.com/politics/1918503|date=25 February 2025|access-date=25 February 2025|website=TASS|language=English}}
{{Cite web|title=‘Trump says whatever he wants’ Putin comments on rare earth metals, U.S.-Russia relations, and slashing defense spending in new interview|url=https://meduza.io/en/feature/2025/02/25/trump-says-whatever-he-wants|date=25 February 2025|access-date=26 February 2025|website=Meduza|language=English}} In Putin's view Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, whom he referred to as "the current head of the regime", stood in the way of peace. He went on to claim that Zelenskyy was "a factor in the disintegration of Ukraine, [Donald] Trump realizes this and wants to revitalize the political environment there, to create conditions for the survival of the Ukrainian state." In the interview Putin stated that Russia is not against the preservation of Ukrainian statehood, but he emphasized that the country should not be used as a "hostile bridgehead"; "So that it eventually becomes a friendly neighboring state." Simultaneously in the interview Putin labelled Russian-occupied territories of Ukraine "the new territories" that he called "our historical territories, which have returned to the Russian Federation."{{Cite web|title=Putin offers Russian and Ukrainian rare minerals to US|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c4gdx7488g5o|date=25 February 2025|access-date=25 February 2025|website=BBC News|language=English}}
{{Cite web|title=Putin offers to sell minerals to Trump, including from Russian-occupied Ukraine|url=https://www.politico.eu/article/vladimir-putin-offer-sell-minerals-donald-trump-russia-occupied-ukraine/|date=25 February 2025|access-date=25 February 2025|website=Politico Europe|language=English}} Putin (went on to) claimed that President Zelenskyy was against peace negotiations because this would lead to the lifting of martial law in Ukraine after which Zelenskyy would loose the presidential election to Valerii Zaluzhnyi (whose rating Putin claimed were twice as high as that of Zelenskyy). On 23 February President Zelenskyy had stated in an international news conference in Kyiv: "If to achieve peace you really need me to give up my post – I'm ready." Zelenskyy also claimed "I am not going to be in power for decades."{{Cite web|title=Zelensky willing to give up presidency in exchange for Nato membership|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cn9vx01evp9o|date=23 February 2025|access-date=25 February 2025|website=BBC News|language=English}}
{{Cite web|title=Zelenskyy says he would ‘quit for peace’ as he refuses US demand for Ukraine minerals|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2025/feb/23/zelenskyy-refuses-trump-demand-to-give-500bn-of-ukraine-minerals-to-us|date=23 February 2025|access-date=25 February 2025|website=The Guardian|language=English}} President Zelenskyy also suggested in this news conference that Russian demands for elections in Ukraine, and the claim that he himself was “an illegitimate President”, were part of "a sweeping" Russian disinformation campaign. He went on to point out that elections in Ukraine are illegal under martial law and "that it would be impossible for soldiers standing in trenches to take part".

Speaking to widows and mothers of Russian soldiers on 6 March 2025 Putin told them “We must win such a version of peace which would suit us and which ensures calm for our country for a long historical perspective." When an attending mother remarked that Russia "shouldn't give in to anyone", Putin said to her "We are not going to do that." He also told the gathering "We don’t want anything that belongs to others, but we won’t give away anything that belongs to us."{{Cite web|title='We won't give away anything that belongs to us' - Putin|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cly28qvp83pt?post=asset%3Af1dac589-a10b-490f-8f17-0289aa977861#post|date=6 March 2025|access-date=6 March 2025|website=BBC News|language=English}}

{{Main|Post-Soviet states|Post-Soviet conflicts}}

Besides Ukraine, several other ex-Soviet and ex-communist countries continue to be flashpoints in the tug-of-war between the West and Russia.{{cite news|last1=Mackinnon|first1=Mark|title=The new Cold War: Pro-Russian influence extends beyond Ukraine|url=https://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/the-new-cold-war-pro-russian-influence-extends-beyond-ukraine/article21840836/|access-date=21 December 2014|newspaper=The Globe and Mail|date=1 December 2014|location=Toronto}} Frozen conflicts in Georgia and Moldova have been major areas of dispute,{{cite news|last1=Oliphant|first1=Roland|title=Merkel fears construction of Cold-War zones across Europe if Russia not given hard counter in Ukraine|url=http://news.nationalpost.com/2014/11/18/merkel-fears-construction-of-cold-war-zones-across-eastern-europe-if-russia-not-given-hard-counter-in-ukraine/|access-date=21 December 2014|newspaper=National Post|date=18 November 2014}} as both countries have breakaway regions that favor annexation by Russia.{{cite news|last1=Toal|first1=Gerard|last2=O'Loughlin|first2=John|title=How people in South Ossetia, Abkhazia and Transnistria feel about annexation by Russia|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/monkey-cage/wp/2014/03/20/how-people-in-south-ossetia-abkhazia-and-transnistria-feel-about-annexation-by-russia/|access-date=21 December 2014|newspaper=Washington Post|date=20 March 2014}} The Baltic Sea and other areas have also caused tension between Russia and the West. The annexation of Crimea sparked new worries that Russia might try to further remake the borders of Eastern Europe.{{cite news|last1=Penhaul|first1=Karl|title=To Russia with love? Transnistria, a territory caught in a time warp|url=http://www.cnn.com/2014/04/11/world/europe/moldova-russia-frozen-conflict/|access-date=21 December 2014|publisher=CNN|date=11 April 2014}}

{{Main|Russo-Georgian War|Georgian–Ossetian conflict|Abkhaz–Georgian conflict|Georgia–Russia relations}}

File:Caucasus regions map2.svg region]]

Since the mid-2000s, Georgia has sought closer relations with the West, while Russia has strongly opposed the expansion of Western institutions to its southern border. Georgia has a long connection with the Russian Federation, as it was a republic of the Soviet Union, and became part of the Russian Empire in 1801. In 2003, the Rose Revolution forced Georgian President Eduard Shevardnadze to resign from office. Shevardnadze had been the leader of the Georgian Communist Party when Georgia was one of the republics of the Soviet Union, and Shevardnadze led Georgia for most of its first decade of independence.{{cite news|last1=Martin|first1=Douglas|title=Eduard Shevardnadze, Foreign Minister Under Gorbachev, Dies at 86|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/08/world/europe/eduard-shevardnadze-soviet-foreign-minister-under-gorbachev-is-dead-at-86.html|access-date=20 December 2014|newspaper=The New York Times|date=7 July 2014}}

Shevardnadze's successor, Mikheil Saakashvili, pursued closer relations with the West.{{cite magazine|last1=de Waal|first1=Thomas|title=So Long, Saakashvili|url=http://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/140227/thomas-de-waal/so-long-saakashvili|access-date=20 December 2014|magazine=Foreign Affairs|date=29 October 2013}} Under President George W. Bush, the United States sought to invite Ukraine and Georgia into NATO. However, Georgia's potential membership in NATO ran into opposition from other NATO members and Russia.{{cite news|last1=Peter|first1=Laurence|title=Why Nato-Russia relations soured before Ukraine|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-29030744|access-date=19 December 2014|publisher=BBC|date=2 September 2014}}{{cite news|title=Bush urging Nato expansion east|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/7326457.stm|access-date=20 December 2014|work=BBC News|date=2 April 2008}} Partly in response to the potential expansion of NATO, Russia initiated the 2008 Russo-Georgian diplomatic crisis by lifting CIS sanctions on Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Though considered to be part of Georgia by the United Nations, Abkhazia and South Ossetia have both sought to secede from Georgia since the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and both are strongly supported by Russia.{{cite news|last1=Herszenhorn|first1=David|title=Pact Tightens Russian Ties With Abkhazia|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/25/world/europe/pact-tightens-russian-ties-with-abkhazia.html|access-date=20 December 2014|newspaper=The New York Times|date=24 November 2014}}

The Russo-Georgian War broke out in August 2008, as Georgia and Russia competed for influence in South Ossetia. Russia was strongly criticised by many Western countries for its part in the war, and the war heightened tensions between NATO and Russia.

The war ended with a unilateral Russian withdrawal of forces from parts of Georgia, but Russian forces continue to occupy parts of Georgia. In November 2014, a Russian-Abkhazian treaty was met with condemnation from Georgia and many Western countries, who feared that Russia might annex Abkhazia much like it annexed Crimea.{{cite news|last1=McLaughlin|first1=Daniel|title=West backs Georgia as Russia stokes new annexation fears|url=https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/west-backs-georgia-as-russia-stokes-new-annexation-fears-1.2014756|access-date=20 December 2014|newspaper=Irish Times|date=25 November 2014}} Georgia continues to pursue a policy of integration with the West.{{cite news|last1=Dreazen|first1=Yochi|title=Look West, Young Man: Georgia's 31-Year-Old Prime Minister Turns To Europe, Not Russia|url=https://foreignpolicy.com/2014/02/26/look-west-young-man-georgias-31-year-old-prime-minister-turns-to-europe-not-russia/|access-date=20 December 2014|publisher=Foreign Policy.com|date=26 February 2014}} Georgia holds a strategic position for the European Union, as it gives the EU access to oil in Azerbaijan and Central Asia without having to rely on Russian pipelines.

Besides Georgia, the other two Caucasus states, Armenia and Azerbaijan, have also been a part of the rivalry between Russia and the West. The two countries are long-time rivals, and have a long-running dispute regarding control of Nagorno-Karabakh.{{cite news|last1=Khojoyan|first1=Sarah|title=New War Risk on Russian Fringe Amid Armenia-Azeri Clashes|url=https://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-08-03/armenia-azeri-war-risks-grow-as-clashes-intensify.html|access-date=22 December 2014|publisher=Bloomberg L.P.|date=4 August 2014}} Armenia has close ties with Russia, while Azerbaijan has close ties to the United States and Turkey, both of which are members of NATO. However, NATO also ties to Armenia, and both Armenia and Azerbaijan have been speculated as potential future members of NATO.{{cite news|last1=Paterson|first1=Tony|title=Ukraine crisis: Nato 'to step up military cooperation with Russia's neighbours'|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/ukraine/10736834/Ukraine-crisis-Nato-to-step-up-military-cooperation-with-Russias-neighbours.html|access-date=22 December 2014|newspaper=The Telegraph|date=1 April 2014|location=London}} Armenia negotiated an Association Agreement with the European Union but, similar to Ukraine, Armenia chose to reject the deal in 2013.{{cite news|last1=Traynor|first1=Ian|title=Ukraine suspends talks on EU trade pact as Putin wins tug of war|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/nov/21/ukraine-suspends-preparations-eu-trade-pact|access-date=2 January 2015|newspaper=The Guardian|date=21 November 2013}} The next year, Armenia voted to join the Eurasian Economic Union, the Russian-backed free trade zone that seeks to rival the European Union.{{cite news|title=The Other EU|url=https://www.economist.com/news/europe/21613319-why-russia-backs-eurasian-union-other-eu|access-date=22 December 2014|newspaper=The Economist|date=23 August 2014}} However, Armenian leaders have also worked towards a free trade agreement with the EU.{{cite news|last1=Herszenhorn|first1=David|title=Armenia Wins Backing to Join Trade Bloc Championed by Putin|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/12/11/world/europe/armenia-russia-eurasian-economic-union.html|access-date=22 December 2014|newspaper=The New York Times|date=10 December 2014}}

{{Main|Transnistria conflict|Moldova–Russia relations}}

File:TransnistrianRegionMap.png is a breakaway territory in Moldova.|243x243px]]

Much like Ukraine, Moldova has experienced internal debates between those favoring closer ties to the West (including joining the European Union) and those favoring closer ties to Russia (including joining the Russian-backed Eurasian Union). Also like Ukraine, Moldova was a part of the Soviet Union; though Moldova was a part of Romania prior to World War II, it was annexed into the Soviet Union in 1940. In May 2014, Moldova signed a major trade deal with the European Union,{{cite news|last1=Peter|first1=Laurence|title=Guide to the EU deals with Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-28038725|access-date=22 December 2014|work=BBC News|date=27 June 2014}} causing Russia to apply pressure on the Moldovan economy, which relies heavily on remittances from Russia.{{cite news|last1=Ciochina|first1=Simon|title=Moldovan migrants denied re-entry to Russia|url=http://www.dw.de/moldovan-migrants-denied-re-entry-to-russia/a-18144394|access-date=22 December 2014|publisher=DeutscheWelle|date=21 December 2014}}

The 2014 Moldovan parliamentary elections saw a victory for an alliance of pro-Western integration parties. Moldova is also home to a breakaway region, known as Transnistria, which forms the Community for Democracy and Rights of Nations along with Abkhazia, South Ossetia, and Nagorno-Karabakh. In 2014, Transnistria held a referendum in which it voted to join the Eurasian Economic Union, and Russia has strong influence over the region. A build-up of Russian forces on the Ukrainian-Russian border caused NATO commander Philip Breedlove to speculate that the Russian Federation might attempt to attack Moldova and occupy Transnistria.{{cite news|last1=Morello|first1=Carol|last2=DeYoung|first2=Karen|title=NATO general warns of further Russian aggression|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/nato-general-warns-of-further-russian-aggression/2014/03/23/2ff63bb6-b269-11e3-8020-b2d790b3c9e1_story.html|access-date=21 December 2014|newspaper=Washington Post|date=24 March 2014}}

{{Main|Estonia–Russia relations|Latvia–Russia relations|Lithuania–Russia relations|Finland–Russia relations|Denmark–Russia relations|Russia–Sweden relations|Norway–Russia relations}}

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The Baltic states of Estonia, Lithuania, and Latvia—all three of which are members of NATO—have warily watched Russian military movements and actions. All three countries, within the Russian Empire prior to 1918, had been annexed by the Soviet Union in 1940 as part of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact, and Russian leaders were particularly distressed by their accession to NATO and the EU in 2004. In 2014, the Baltic states reported several incursions into their air space by Russian military aircraft.

File:Vladimir Putin and Sauli Niinistö in Helsinki (2019-08-21) 19.jpg in Helsinki, 21 August 2019]]

Tensions rose as Russian intelligence forces crossed the Estonian border and captured Estonian Internal Security Service officer Eston Kohver.{{cite news|last1=Higgins|first1=Andrew|title=Tensions Surge in Estonia Amid a Russian Replay of Cold War Tactics|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/06/world/europe/estonia-russia-cold-war-eston-kohver-border.html|access-date=21 December 2014|newspaper=The New York Times|date=5 October 2014}} In October 2014, Sweden engaged in a hunt for a foreign submarine that had entered its waters; suspicions that the submarine was Russian have caused further alarm in the Baltic states.{{cite news|last1=Ritter|first1=Karl|last2=Huuhtanen|first2=Matti|title=Submarine hunt sends Cold War chill across Baltic|url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/submarine-hunt-sends-cold-war-chill-across-baltic/2014/10/20/a8768830-5899-11e4-bd61-346aee66ba29_story.html|access-date=21 December 2014|newspaper=Washington Post|date=20 October 2014}} However, the Swedish Armed Forces later admitted that the alleged sighting of a Russian sub was actually just a "workboat".{{Cite news|url=https://www.thelocal.se/20150413/suspected-sub-in-swedish-waters-was-working-boat|title='Submarine' in Sweden was only civilian boat|newspaper=The Local Sweden |date=2015-04-13|access-date=2016-09-26}} The tensions in the Baltic and other areas have led neighboring Sweden and Finland, both of which have long been neutral states, to openly discuss joining NATO.{{cite news|last1=Scrutton|first1=Alistair|last2=Johnson |first2=Simon|title=Swedish 'Cold War' thriller exposes Baltic Sea nerves over Russia|url=https://www.reuters.com/article/us-sweden-deployment-idUSKCN0I91T220141020 |access-date=21 December 2014|work=Reuters|date=20 October 2014}} Due to the Russian invasion, both Sweden and Finland began the process of negotiating to join NATO.

In early April 2015, British press publications, with a reference to semi-official sources within the Russian military and intelligence establishment, suggested that Russia was ready to use any means—including nuclear weapons—to forestall NATO moving more forces into the Baltic states.{{cite news|title=Russia threatens to use 'nuclear force' over Crimea and the Baltic states|url=https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/russia-threatens-to-use-nuclear-force-over-crimea-and-the-baltic-states-10150565.html|access-date=2 April 2015|work=The Independent|date=2 April 2015|location=London|first=Ian|last=Johnston}}{{cite news|title=Putin threat of nuclear showdown over Baltics|url=https://www.thetimes.com/world/us-world/article/putin-threat-of-nuclear-showdown-over-baltics-c6wvhfbpf87|access-date=2 April 2015|work=The Times|date=2 April 2015}}

{{update|section|date=May 2017}}

{{main|Indonesia–Russia relations|Australia–Russia relations|Russia–Venezuela relations|Cuba–Russia relations|Brazil–Russia relations|Nicaragua–Russia relations}}

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Putin and his successor Medvedev have enjoyed warm relations with Hugo Chávez of Venezuela. Much of this has been through the sale of military equipment; since 2005, Venezuela has purchased more than $4 billion worth of arms from Russia.[http://www.france24.com/en/20080925-russia-nuclear-putin-chavez-nuclear-energy Russia forges nuclear links with Venezuela] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131110051027/http://www.france24.com/en/20080925-russia-nuclear-putin-chavez-nuclear-energy |date=2013-11-10 }} france24.com In September 2008, Russia sent Tupolev Tu-160 bombers to Venezuela to carry out training flights.{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7609577.stm|title=Russian bombers land in Venezuela|date=11 September 2008|access-date=27 September 2017|via=BBC News}} In December 2008, both countries held a joint naval exercise in the Caribbean Sea.{{cite news|url=http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7764592.stm|title=Russia ends Venezuela naval drill|work=BBC News|date=4 December 2008 |access-date=2023-02-21}} Earlier in 2000, Putin had re-established stronger ties with Fidel Castro's Cuba.{{Cite web |date=2014-07-27 |title=Putin kicks off Latin America tour with Cuba stop |url=http://bigstory.ap.org/article/putin-kicks-latin-america-tour-cuba-stop |access-date=2022-11-08 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140727221407/http://bigstory.ap.org/article/putin-kicks-latin-america-tour-cuba-stop |archive-date=27 July 2014 }} Putin continued good relations with Venezuela under the successor of Chávez, Nicolas Maduro, supporting him after NATO and the European Union broke off ties with Venezuela due to claims of fraud in the 2018 presidential elections.{{Cite news |date=2018-05-21 |title=Venezuela election: Fourteen ambassadors recalled after Maduro win |language=en-GB |work=BBC News |url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-44204632 |access-date=2022-11-08}} In December 2018, Russia and Venezuela once again conducted joint military exercises and in 2020, CNBC stated that Russia was Venezuela's primary geopolitical ally.{{Cite news |title=In Venezuela, Russia pockets key energy assets in exchange for cash bailouts |language=en-US |newspaper=Washington Post |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/in-venezuela-russia-pockets-key-energy-assets-in-exchange-for-cash-bailouts/2018/12/20/da458db6-f403-11e8-80d0-f7e1948d55f4_story.html |access-date=2022-11-08 |issn=0190-8286}}{{Cite web |last=Ellyatt |first=Holly |title=From Africa to Azerbaijan, here's how far Russia's global influence stretches |url=https://www.cnbc.com/2020/02/10/russias-global-influence-stretches-from-venezuela-to-syria.html |access-date=2022-11-08 |website=CNBC |date=10 February 2020 |language=en}}

In 2022, both Cuba and Venezuela expressed support for the Russian invasion of Ukraine.{{Cite web |last=Luján |first=Raylí |date=2022-03-24 |title=Russia-Venezuela Relations Remain Deep Despite Global Isolation of Moscow |url=https://www.bloomberglinea.com/english/russia-venezuela-relations-remain-deep-despite-global-isolation-of-moscow/ |access-date=2022-11-08 |website=Bloomberg Línea |language=en-US}}{{Cite news |last=Sherwood |first=Dave |date=2022-02-19 |title=Cuba to deepen ties with Russia as Ukraine tensions mount |language=en |work=Reuters |url=https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/cuba-deepen-ties-with-russia-ukraine-tensions-mount-2022-02-19/ |access-date=2022-11-08}}

In September 2007, Putin visited Indonesia and in doing so became the first Russian leader to visit the country in more than 50 years.{{cite web|url=http://brtsis.com/rrubb.htm|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20071012181540/http://brtsis.com/rrubb.htm|archive-date=12 October 2007|title=Russia Courts Indonesia|date=12 October 2007|access-date=2011-09-24}} In the same month, Putin also attended the APEC meeting held in Sydney, Australia where he met with Australian Prime Minister John Howard and signed a uranium trade deal. This was the first visit by a Russian president to Australia.

{{Main|Energy policy of Russia}}

The Russian economy is heavily dependent on the export of natural resources such as oil and natural gas, and Russia has used these resources to its political advantage.{{Cite news|title=Russia's State-Controlled Gas Firm Announces Plan to Double Price for Georgia|newspaper=Washington Post|date=2007-11-03 |url=https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/11/02/AR2006110201520.html|access-date= 2014-12-25|first=Peter|last=Finn}}{{Cite news|title=Putin's 'Last and Best Weapon' Against Europe: Gas |date=2014-09-24|url=http://www.newsweek.com/2014/10/03/putins-last-and-best-weapon-against-europe-gas-272652.html |access-date=2015-01-03|first=Owen|last=Matthews}} Meanwhile, the US and other Western countries have worked to lessen the dependency of Europe on Russia and its resources.{{cite news|last1=Klapper|first1=Bradley|title=New Cold War: US, Russia fight over Europe's energy future|url=https://www.apnews.com/5c5890b2e38040b692a84d6a02ad751b|access-date=12 February 2015|publisher=Associated Press|date=3 February 2015}}

Starting in the mid-2000s, Russia and Ukraine had several disputes in which Russia threatened to cut off the supply of gas. As a great deal of Russia's gas is exported to Europe through the pipelines crossing Ukraine, those disputes affected several other European countries. Under Putin, special efforts were made to gain control over the European energy sector.

Russian influence played a major role in canceling the construction of the Nabucco pipeline, which would have supplied natural gas from Azerbaijan, in favor of South Stream (though South Stream itself was also later canceled). Russia has also sought to create a Eurasian Economic Union consisting of itself and other post-Soviet countries.{{cite news|last1=Neyfakh |first1=Leon|title=Putin's long game? Meet the Eurasian Union|url=https://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2014/03/09/putin-long-game-meet-eurasian-union/1eKLXEC3TJfzqK54elX5fL/story.html |access-date=21 January 2015|work=Boston Globe|date=9 March 2014}}

Like many other countries, Russia's economy suffered during the Great Recession. Following the annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation, several countries (including most of NATO) imposed sanctions on Russia, hurting the Russian economy by cutting off access to capital.{{cite news|last1=Stewart|first1=James|title=Why Russia Can't Afford Another Cold War|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/08/business/why-russia-cant-afford-another-cold-war.html|access-date=3 January 2015|work=The New York Times|date=7 March 2014}}{{cite news|url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/russian-companies-clamor-for-dollars-to-repay-debt-1412860551|title=Russian Companies Clamor for Dollars to Repay Debt|author=Chiara Albanese and Ben Edwards|date=9 October 2014|access-date=16 December 2014|work=The Wall Street Journal}} At the same time, the global price of oil declined.{{cite news|last1=Chung|first1=Frank|title=The Cold War is back, and colder|url=http://www.news.com.au/finance/economy/the-cold-war-is-back-and-colder/story-e6frflo9-1227159436375|access-date=17 December 2014|publisher=News.au|date=18 December 2014|archive-date=2015-08-14 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150814142811/http://www.news.com.au/finance/economy/the-cold-war-is-back-and-colder/story-e6frflo9-1227159436375|url-status=dead}} The combination of international sanctions and the falling crude price in 2014 and thereafter resulted in the ongoing 2014–15 Russian financial crisis. As a way to get around sanctions, Russia and China signed a 150 billion yuan central bank liquidity swap line agreement to get around American sanctions{{cite news |url=https://sg.news.yahoo.com/china-russia-seek-international-justice-agree-currency-swap-185306361.html |title=China, Russia seek 'international justice', agree currency swap line |last1=Smolchenko |first1=Anna |date=13 October 2014 |publisher=Yahoo! News |agency=AFP |access-date=13 October 2014}} and agreed to a US$400 billion deal which would supply natural gas to China over the next 30 years.

• Munich speech of Vladimir Putin on 10 February 2007
• Crimean speech of Vladimir Putin on 18 March 2014
• Valdai speech of Vladimir Putin on 24 October 2014
• Crimean speech on 4 December 2014{{cite web |url=http://eng.kremlin.ru/news/23341 |title=Presidential Address to the Federal Assembly |publisher=The Kremlin, Moscow, Russia |date=4 December 2014 |access-date=16 March 2017}}
• U.N. General Assembly speech on 28 September 2015{{cite web |url=http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/50385 |title=70th Session of the United Nations General Assembly |date=28 September 2015 |publisher=The Kremlin, Moscow, Russia |access-date=16 March 2017}}

• List of international presidential trips made by Vladimir Putin
• Second Cold War
• Foreign relations of Russia
• Foundations of Geopolitics
• International relations since 1989
• Russia–United States relations
• China–Russia relations
• Brezhnev Doctrine

{{Further|Russia–United States relations#Since 1991}}

• Bellamy, Alex J. Warmonger: Vladimir Putin's Imperial Wars (Agenda Publishing, 2024). [https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showpdf.php?id=60988 online review of this book]
• Bukkvoll, Tor. "Why Putin Went To War: Ideology, Interests and Decision-making in the Russian Use of Force in Crimea and Donbas." Contemporary Politics (2016). 22#3 pp. 267–282.

• Cohen, Stephen F. War with Russia?: From Putin & Ukraine to Trump & Russiagate (Simon and Schuster, 2018), sympathetic to Putin.
• Kanet, Roger E. and Dina Moulioukova, eds. Russia and the World in the Putin Era: From Theory to Reality in Russian Global Strategy (Routledge, 2021)

• Kuzmarov, Jeremy. "'A New Battlefield for the United States': Russia Sanctions and the New Cold War." Socialism and Democracy 33.3 (2019): 34-66. [https://www.academia.edu/download/68826562/08854300.2020.pdf online]{{dead link|date=February 2025|bot=medic}}{{cbignore|bot=medic}}
• Markedonov, Sergey M., and Maxim A. Suchkov. "Russia and the United States in the Caucasus: cooperation and competition." Caucasus Survey 8.2 (2020): 179-195. [https://old.mgimo.ru/upload/iblock/dbc/Russia%20and%20the%20United%20States%20in%20the%20Caucasus%20(2020).pdf online]
• Michael McFaul. 2020. "Putin, Putinism, and the Domestic Determinants of Russian Foreign Policy." International Security.
• Nygren, Bertil. The Rebuilding of Greater Russia: Putin's Foreign Policy Towards the CIS Countries. (Routledge, 2007)
• Orlova, Victoria V. "US–Russia Relations in the Last 30 Years: From a Rapprochement to a Meltdown." in 30 Years since the Fall of the Berlin Wall ( Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore, 2020) pp. 117–138.
• Parker, David. US Foreign Policy Towards Russia in the Post-Cold War Era: Ideational Legacies and Institutionalised Conflict and Co-operation (Routledge, 2019).
• Reif, Kingston, and Shannon Bugos. "Putin invites US to extend New START." Arms Control Today 50.1 (2020): 25-27. [https://www.jstor.org/stable/26891340 online]
• Rosefielde, Steven. Putin's Russia: Economy, Defence and Foreign Policy (2021)

• Sakwa, Richard. "One Europe or none? Monism, involution and relations with Russia." Europe-Asia Studies 70.10 (2018): 1656–1667. EU and Russia [https://kar.kent.ac.uk/92181/1/Sakwa%20-%20Deception%20full%20v4%20-%20final.pdf online]
• Shen, Zhihua, ed. A Short History of Sino-Soviet Relations, 1917–1991 (Springer Singapore;Palgrave Macmillan, 2020)
• Stent, Angela E. The Limits of Partnership: U.S. Russian Relations in the Twenty-First Century (Princeton UP, 2014) 355 pages; [https://books.google.com/books?id=jfaKAQAAQBAJ excerpt and text search]
• Stent, Angela. Putin's World: Russia Against the West and with the Rest (2019)
• Thorun, Christian. Explaining Change in Russian Foreign Policy: The Role of Ideas in Post-Soviet Russia's Conduct towards the West (Palgrave Macmillan UK, 2009)

{{Reflist|group=nb}}

{{reflist}}

• Ambrosio, Thomas, and Geoffrey Vandrovec. "Mapping the Geopolitics of the Russian Federation: The Federal Assembly Addresses of Putin and Medvedev." Geopolitics (2013) 18#2 pp 435–466.
• Bechev, Dimitar, et al. eds. Russia Rising: Putin's Foreign Policy in the Middle East and North Africa (I.B. Tauris, 2021)

• Bellamy, Alex J. Warmonger: Vladimir Putin's Imperial Wars (Agenda Publishing, 2024).[https://www.h-net.org/reviews/showpdf.php?id=60988 online review of this book]

• Gvosdev, Nikolas K., and Christopher Marsh. Russian Foreign Policy: Interests, Vectors, and Sectors (Washington: CQ Press, 2013)
• Kanet, Roger E. Russian foreign policy in the 21st century (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010)
• Larson, Deborah Welch, and Alexei Shevchenko. "Status seekers: Chinese and Russian responses to US primacy." International Security (2010) 34#4 pp. 63–95.
• Legvold, Robert, ed. Russian Foreign Policy in the 21st Century and the Shadow of the Past (2007).
• Mankoff, Jeffrey. Russian Foreign Policy: The Return of Great Power Politics (2nd ed. 2011).
• Myers, Steven Lee. The New Tsar: The Rise and Reign of Vladimir Putin (2015)
• Nation, R. Craig, and Dmitri Trenin. "Russian security strategy under Putin: US and Russian perspectives." (Army War College 2007). [https://press.armywarcollege.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1662&context=monographs online]
• Orlova, Victoria V. "US–Russia Relations in the Last 30 Years: From a Rapprochement to a Meltdown." in 30 Years since the Fall of the Berlin Wall (Palgrave Macmillan, Singapore, 2020) pp. 117–138.
• Rosefielde, Steven. Putin's Russia: Economy, Defence and Foreign Policy (2021)

• Schoen, Douglas E. and Melik Kaylan. Return to Winter: Russia, China, and the New Cold War Against America (2015)
• Stent, Angela E. The Limits of Partnership: U.S. Russian Relations in the Twenty-First Century (Princeton UP, 2014) 355 pages; [https://books.google.com/books?id=jfaKAQAAQBAJ excerpt and text search]
• Tsygankov, Andrei P. "The Russia-NATO mistrust: Ethnophobia and the double expansion to contain "the Russian Bear"." Communist and Post-Communist Studies (2013).

• {{cite news|url=https://www.cnbc.com/2018/03/01/putin-new-russia-missile-nuclear.html|title=Putin reveals new Russian missile that can 'reach any point in the world|language=en|author= H. Ellyatt|date= March 1, 2018|location= Moscow|publisher= CNBC.com|access-date= March 21, 2018|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180301133216/https://www.cnbc.com/video/2018/03/01/russias-putin-unveils-new-nuclear-missile.html|archive-date= March 1, 2018|url-status=live|quote= Putin joked that the two new strategic nuclear weapons he described — the global cruise missile and the subsurface unmanned vehicle — did not have names yet,[...] and new system capable of destroying intercontinental targets with hypersonic speed and high-precision, able to maneuver both in terms of its course and altitude.}}
• {{cite episode|title=Putin and the Presidents|series=FRONTLINE|series-link=Frontline (American TV program)|network=PBS|station=WGBH|season=41|number=8|url=https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/documentary/putin-and-the-presidents/|access-date=November 28, 2024}}

{{Vladimir Putin}}

{{DEFAULTSORT:Foreign Policy Of Vladimir Putin}}

Category:Foreign relations of Russia

Category:Vladimir Putin

Putin, Vladimir

Category:History of Russia (1991–present)

Putin, Vladimir