The world needs Russia and there is nothing Washington or Brussels can do about it, President Vladimir Putin told the Valdai Forum on Thursday. America and its allies are simply trying to go against the march of history as they pursue their hegemonistic aspirations, he said.
“The flow of international politics is..... running counter to the aspirations of the West,” Putin said. The world is moving away “from a fading hegemonistic world towards a rising multipolarity.”
The “old hegemons” that had become accustomed to ruling over the world as they did during colonial times see that they are no longer being listened to, the president said. Putin also warned that the West’s beliefs about its own exceptionalism could potentially “lead to a global tragedy.”
Calls by the US and its allies to inflict a “strategic defeat” on Russia – a nation with one of the biggest nuclear arsenals – demonstrate the recklessness of Western politicians that just goes beyond all bounds, the president stated, warning the West against “blind faith in its own impunity.”
No one can guarantee that nuclear weapons won’t be used if the moral and legal foundations of international relations are destroyed, Putin said. Attempts by the West to keep its “elusive power” through the use of force would only lead to global instability, tensions, casualties and destruction, he warned.
The policies of the Western elites cannot bring about the result they are seeking, according to Putin. Instead, this constant race for world dominance and its “liberal globalist messianism” only drain the power of their own nations and “go against the true interests of the people in the US and the European nations.”
Modern liberalism in the West has degenerated into its very opposite, the Russian president believes. It is now characterized by “extreme intolerance and aggression towards any alternative [views], to any independent thought,” he said, adding that its proponents still “justify neo-Nazism, terrorism, and racism, as well as the massive genocide of civilians.”
The West has also started treating democracy not as the majority rule but minority rule, according to Putin. “Traditional democracy and the popular rule are set against some abstract “freedom” that is apparently worth … sacrificing the will of the majority, freedom of speech and media independence,” he said.
Unlike its opponents, Russia does not treat Western civilization as an enemy, Putin stated. “We never say: you’re either with us, or against us’,” the president said. “Our position is an open one,” he told the forum, adding that Moscow is not planning to impose its worldview on anyone.
Russia acknowledges that the West is one of the key elements of the international political system that has accumulated vast human, intellectual and material resources, the president said. Yet, “any hegemonism is off the table in the new international system,” he added. When Washington and its allies finally accept this fact, a true era of constructive cooperation will follow, Putin believes.
“I hope to God it will happen as soon as possible. It is in everyone’s interests, including the interests of the West itself,” the president concluded.
Russian President Vladimir Putin is taking part in a plenary session at the 21st Annual Meeting of the Valdai International Discussion Club in Sochi this week. The topic of the session is ‘Security for Everyone. Together – Into a New World’. This year’s event is taking place under the motto ‘A Lasting Peace – On What Basis? Universal Security and Equal Opportunities for Development in the 21st Century’.