Russia has many supporters in the United States and Europe, who support Ukraine in the confrontation with the Russian army, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday, EFE reports. Agerpres.

“There are a lot of people in the US who think like us, and we in Europe do too. Elites behave differently. But we know that elites do not always promote policies in the interests of their people. And it will eventually turn against them,” Putin said, speaking before the Council of Legislators of the Federal Assembly in St. Petersburg.

Russia wants to expand relations with Eurasia, Africa and Latin America

The Kremlin, Putin emphasized, has no intention of following the path of isolation. “On the contrary, we will expand pragmatic, equal, mutually beneficial and exclusively partnership relations with friendly countries of Eurasia, Africa and Latin America,” he said.

“We are ready to work with those foreign partners, companies and global corporations that care about their reputation and want to cooperate with Russia,” Putin told the leaders of the five parties represented in parliament and other prominent deputies and senators.

Putin accused Russia’s “former partners” of “maniacally” destroying the channels of dialogue, international law and the desire to impose their own rules on Moscow.

“What are the rules? No one has seen them. Who wrote them? They write them under the blanket and do something with them there. But we do not intend to crawl under their blanket and we do not intend to respect these rules,” said the Russian president, who was quoted by Russian state media.

He insisted that patriotism and public service were ideal for Russia, a “civilized country” that had become “one of the autonomous and sovereign centers of the great multipolar world.”

Putin emphasized that the national economy has withstood the onslaught of Western sanctions, and their authors are paying for the consequences of the instability they themselves caused.

At the same time, he emphasized that in times of “economic aggression from the West,” the government and all local authorities should work “as a well-tuned mechanism.”

Putin obliged both chambers of the federal parliament – the State Duma and the Federation Council – to take measures to support the participants of the military campaign and for the “full integration” of the four annexed Ukrainian territories (Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia). .

“These are our historic lands and these are our people. Many of you have been there. How are they different from the other side and other parts of our nation? Not at all. They are part of our people,” he said.

On Thursday evening, Putin issued a decree according to which, starting in mid-2024, all residents of the occupied Ukrainian territories who do not accept Russian citizenship can be deported.

The Russian economy has faced numerous challenges this year, including a weaker ruble, lower energy revenues and increased isolation as Western countries continue to impose sanctions over its actions in Ukraine, Reuters noted.

Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said on Friday that Moscow’s forecast for a 2023 budget deficit of no more than 2% of gross domestic product (GDP) is still valid, but it will depend on oil and gas revenues, Russian news agencies reported.

On February 24, Russia launched an invasion of Ukraine that it calls a “special military operation,” and Kyiv and the West call it a brutal, illegal, unprovoked and unjustified aggression, the first of its kind in Europe since World War II.