"I want the Kyiv authorities and their real
masters in the West to hear me, so that everyone
remembers this"
Vladimir Putin:
Dear citizens of Russia, citizens of the Donetsk
and Lugansk People's Republics, residents of the
Zaporozhye and Kherson regions, deputies of the
State Duma, and senators of the Russian
Federation!
You
know, referendums were held in the Donetsk and
Luhansk People's Republics, Zaporozhye and
Kherson regions. Their results have been summed
up, the results are known. People made their
choice, a clear choice.
Today
we are signing agreements on the admission of
the Donetsk People's Republic, the Luhansk
People's Republic, the Zaporizhia Region and the
Kherson Region to Russia. I am sure that the
Federal Assembly will support the constitutional
laws on the adoption and formation in Russia of
four new regions, four new subjects of the
Russian Federation, because this is the will of
millions of people.
(Applause.)
And
this, of course, is their right, their
inalienable right, which is enshrined in the
first article of the UN Charter, which directly
speaks of the principle of equal rights and
self-determination of peoples.
I
repeat: this is an inalienable right of people,
it is based on historical unity, in the name of
which the generations of our ancestors won,
those who from the origins of Ancient Russia for
centuries created and defended Russia. Here, in
Novorossia, Rumyantsev, Suvorov and Ushakov
fought, Catherine II and Potemkin founded new
cities. Here our grandfathers and
great-grandfathers stood to death during the
Great Patriotic War.
We
will always remember the heroes of the “Russian
spring”, those who did not come to terms with
the neo-Nazi coup in Ukraine in 2014, all those
who died for the right to speak their native
language, preserve their culture, traditions,
faith, for the right to live. These are the
warriors of Donbass, the martyrs of the "Odessa
Khatyn", the victims of inhuman terrorist
attacks staged by the Kyiv regime. These are
volunteers and militias, these are civilians,
children, women, old people, Russians,
Ukrainians, people of various nationalities.
This is the real people's leader of Donetsk
Alexander Zakharchenko, these are military
commanders Arsen Pavlov and Vladimir Zhoga, Olga
Kochura and Alexei Mozgovoy, this is the
prosecutor of the Luhansk Republic Sergey
Gorenko. This is paratrooper Nurmagomed
Gadzhimagomedov and all our soldiers and
officers who died the death of the brave during
a special military operation. They are heroes.
(Applause.)Heroes
of Great Russia. And I ask you to honor their
memory with a moment of silence.
(Moment of silence.)
Thank
you.
Behind
the choice of millions of residents in the
Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics, in the
Zaporozhye and Kherson regions is our common
destiny and a thousand-year history. This
spiritual connection people passed on to their
children and grandchildren. Despite all the
trials, they carried love for Russia through the
years. And no one can destroy this feeling in
us. That is why both the older generations and
the youth, those who were born after the tragedy
of the collapse of the Soviet Union, voted for
our unity, for our common future.
In
1991, in Belovezhskaya Pushcha, without asking
the will of ordinary citizens, representatives
of the then party elites decided to collapse the
USSR, and people suddenly found themselves cut
off from their homeland. This tore apart,
dismembered our people's community, turned into
a national catastrophe. As once after the
revolution the borders of the union republics
were cut behind the scenes, so the last leaders
of the Soviet Union, contrary to the direct
expression of the will of the majority of people
in the 1991 referendum, ruined our great
country, simply confronted the peoples with a
fact.
I
admit that they did not even fully understand
what they were doing and what consequences this
would inevitably lead to in the end. But that
doesn't matter anymore. There is no Soviet
Union, the past cannot be returned. Yes, and
Russia today does not need it anymore, we are
not striving for this. But there is nothing
stronger than the determination of millions of
people who, by their culture, faith, traditions,
language, consider themselves part of Russia,
whose ancestors lived in a single state for
centuries. There is nothing stronger than the
determination of these people to return to their
true, historical Fatherland.
For a
long eight years, people in the Donbass were
subjected to genocide, shelling and blockade,
and in Kherson and Zaporozhye they tried to
criminally cultivate hatred for Russia, for
everything Russian. Now, already during the
referendums, the Kyiv regime threatened with
violence, death to school teachers, women who
worked in election commissions, intimidated
millions of people who came to express their
will with repressions. But the unbroken people
of Donbass, Zaporozhye and Kherson had their
say.
I
want the Kyiv authorities and their real masters
in the West to hear me, so that everyone
remembers this: people living in Lugansk and
Donetsk, Kherson and Zaporozhye become our
citizens forever.
(Applause.)
We
call on the Kyiv regime to immediately cease
fire, all hostilities, the war that it unleashed
back in 2014, and return to the negotiating
table. We are ready for this, it has been said
more than once. But we will not discuss the
choice of the people in Donetsk, Luhansk,
Zaporozhye and Kherson, it has been made, Russia
will not betray it.
(Applause.)
And today's Kiev authorities should treat this
free will of the people with respect, and
nothing else. This is the only way to peace.
We
will protect our land with all the forces and
means at our disposal and will do everything to
ensure the safe life of our people. This is the
great liberation mission of our people.
We will
definitely rebuild destroyed cities and towns,
housing, schools, hospitals, theaters and
museums, restore and develop industrial
enterprises, factories, infrastructure, social
security, pensions, healthcare and education
systems.
Of
course, we will work on improving the level of
security. Together we will make sure that
citizens in the new regions feel the support of
the entire people of Russia, the entire country,
all the republics, all territories and regions
of our vast Motherland.
(Applause.)
Dear
friends, colleagues!
Today
I want to address the soldiers and officers who
are participating in a special military
operation, the soldiers of Donbass and
Novorossia, those who, after the decree on
partial mobilization, join the ranks of the
Armed Forces, fulfilling their patriotic duty,
who, at the call of their hearts, come to the
military registration and enlistment offices. I
would like to turn to their parents, wives, and
children, to tell them what our people are
fighting for, what enemy is opposing us, who is
throwing the world into new wars and crises,
deriving their bloody profit from this tragedy.
Our
compatriots, our brothers and sisters in Ukraine
- the native part of our united people - saw
with their own eyes what the ruling circles of
the so-called West are preparing for all
mankind. Here they, in fact, just threw off
their masks, showed their true insides.
After
the collapse of the Soviet Union, the West
decided that the world, all of us, would forever
have to put up with its dictates. Then, in 1991,
the West expected that Russia would not recover
from such shocks and would fall apart on its
own. Yes, it almost happened - we remember the
90s, the terrible 90s, hungry, cold and
hopeless. But Russia resisted, revived,
strengthened, again took its rightful place in
the world.
At the
same time, the West has been looking all this
time and continues to look for a new chance to
hit us, weaken and destroy Russia, which they
have always dreamed of, split our state, pit
peoples against each other, doom them to poverty
and extinction. They are simply haunted by the
fact that there is such a great, huge country in
the world with its territory, natural wealth,
resources, with a people who do not know how and
will never live according to someone else's
orders.
The
West is ready to step over everything to
preserve the neo-colonial system that allows it
to parasitize, in fact, plunder the world at the
expense of the power of the dollar and
technological dictates, collect real tribute
from humanity, extract the main source of
unearned prosperity, the rent of the hegemon.
The maintenance of this rent is their key,
genuine and absolutely self-serving motive. That
is why total desovereignization is in their
interests. Hence their aggression towards
independent states, towards traditional values
and original cultures, attempts to undermine
international and integration processes beyond
their control, new world currencies and centers
of technological development. It is critical for
them that all countries surrender their
sovereignty to the United States.
The
ruling elites of some states voluntarily agree
to do this, voluntarily agree to become vassals;
others are bribed, intimidated. And if it
doesn’t work out, they destroy entire states,
leaving behind humanitarian catastrophes,
disasters, ruins, millions of ruined, mangled
human destinies, terrorist enclaves, social
disaster zones, protectorates, colonies and
semi-colonies. They don't care, as long as they
get their own benefit.
I want
to emphasize once again: it is precisely in
greed, in the intention to preserve its
unlimited power, that there are the real reasons
for the hybrid war that the “collective West” is
waging against Russia. They do not wish us
freedom, but they want to see us as a colony.
They want not equal cooperation, but robbery.
They want to see us not as a free society, but
as a crowd of soulless slaves.
For
them, a direct threat is our thought and
philosophy, and therefore they encroach on our
philosophers. Our culture and art are a danger
to them, so they are trying to ban them. Our
development and prosperity is also a threat to
them - competition is growing. They don't need
Russia at all, we need it.
(Applause.)
I want
to remind you that the claims to world
domination in the past have been shattered more
than once by the courage and steadfastness of
our people. Russia will always be Russia. We
will continue to defend both our values and
our Motherland.
The
West is counting on impunity, on getting away
with everything. In fact, everything has gotten
away with it so far. Agreements in the field of
strategic security go to the wastebasket;
agreements reached at the highest political
level are declared false; firm promises not to
expand NATO to the east, as soon as our former
leaders bought into them, turned into a dirty
deceit; treaties on anti-missile defense and
intermediate- and shorter-range missiles have
been unilaterally broken under far-fetched
pretexts.
All we
hear from all sides is that the West stands for
order based on rules. Where did they come from?
Who even saw these rules? Who agreed? Listen,
this is just some kind of nonsense, sheer
deception, double or already triple standards!
It's just designed for fools.
Russia
is a great millennial power, a
country-civilization, and will not live by such
rigged, false rules.
(Applause.)
It is
the so-called West that has trampled on the
principle of the inviolability of borders, and
now it decides at its own discretion who has the
right to self-determination and who does not,
who is not worthy of it. Why they decide so, who
gave them such a right is not clear. To
themselves.
That
is why the choice of people in the Crimea, in
Sevastopol, in Donetsk, Lugansk, Zaporozhye and
Kherson causes wild anger in them. This West has
no moral right to evaluate it, even to stutter
about the freedom of democracy. No, and never
was!
Western elites deny not only national
sovereignty and international law. Their
hegemony has a pronounced character of
totalitarianism, despotism and apartheid. They
brazenly divide the world into their vassals,
into the so-called civilized countries and into
all the rest, who, according to the plan of
today's Western racists, should join the list of
barbarians and savages. False labels - "rogue
country", "authoritarian regime" - are already
ready, they stigmatize entire peoples and
states, and there is nothing new in this. There
is nothing new in this: the Western elites are
what they were, and have remained so -
colonialist. They discriminate, divide peoples
into the first and other grades.
We
have never accepted and will never accept such
political nationalism and racism. And what, if
not racism, is Russophobia, which is now
spreading all over the world? What, if not
racism, is the peremptory conviction of the West
that its civilization, neoliberal culture is an
indisputable model for the whole world? "He who
is not with us is against us." It even sounds
strange.
The
Western elites even shift repentance for their
own historical crimes onto everyone else,
demanding both the citizens of their countries
and other peoples to confess for what they have
nothing to do with at all, for example, for the
period of colonial conquests.
It is
worth reminding the West that it began its
colonial policy back in the Middle Ages, and
then followed the global slave trade, the
genocide of Indian tribes in America, the
plunder of India, Africa, the wars of England
and France against China, as a result of which
it was forced to open its ports for trade opium.
What they did was put entire nations on drugs,
purposefully exterminated entire ethnic groups
for the sake of land and resources, staged a
real hunt for people like animals. This is
contrary to the very nature of man, truth,
freedom and justice.
And we
- we are proud that in the 20th century it was
our country that led the anti-colonial movement,
which opened up opportunities for many peoples
of the world to develop in order to reduce
poverty and inequality, to overcome hunger and
disease.
I
emphasize that one of the reasons for the
centuries-old Russophobia, the undisguised
malice of these Western elites towards Russia is
precisely that we did not allow ourselves to be
robbed during the period of colonial conquests,
we forced the Europeans to trade for mutual
benefit. This was achieved by creating a strong
centralized state in Russia, which developed and
strengthened itself on the great moral values
of Orthodoxy, Islam, Judaism and Buddhism, on
Russian culture and the Russian word open to
all.
It is
known that plans for interventions in Russia
were repeatedly made, they tried to use the Time
of Troubles at the beginning of the 17th
century, and the period of upheavals after 1917
failed. The West still managed to seize the
wealth of Russia at the end of the 20th century,
when the state was destroyed. Then we were
called both friends and partners, but in fact
they treated us like a colony - trillions of
dollars were siphoned out of the country under a
variety of schemes. We all remember everything,
we have not forgotten anything.
And
these days, people in Donetsk and Luhansk, in
Kherson and Zaporizhia have spoken out in favor
of restoring our historical unity. Thank you!
(Applause.)
Western countries have been repeating for
centuries that they bring freedom and democracy
to other peoples. Everything is exactly the
opposite: instead of democracy - suppression and
exploitation; instead of freedom - enslavement
and violence. The entire unipolar world order is
inherently anti-democratic and not free, it is
deceitful and hypocritical through and through.
The
United States is the only country in the world
to have used nuclear weapons twice, destroying
the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
By the way, they set a precedent.
Let me
also remind you that the United States, together
with the British, turned Dresden, Hamburg,
Cologne and many other German cities into ruins
without any military necessity during World War
II. And this was done defiantly, without any, I
repeat, military necessity. There was only one
goal: just like in the case of the nuclear
bombings in Japan, to intimidate both our
country and the whole world.
The
United States left a terrible mark on the memory
of the peoples of Korea and Vietnam with
barbaric "carpet" bombing, the use of napalm and
chemical weapons.
Until
now, they actually occupy Germany, Japan, the
Republic of Korea and other countries, and at
the same time cynically call them equal allies.
Listen, I wonder what kind of alliance is this?
The whole world knows that the leaders of these
countries are being watched, the first persons
of these states are being installed listening
devices not only in office, but also in
residential premises. This is a real shame. A
shame both for those who do this and for those
who, like a slave, silently and meekly swallow
this rudeness.
They
call orders and rude, insulting shouts at the
address of their vassals Euro-Atlantic
solidarity, the development of biological
weapons, experiments on living people, including
in Ukraine, noble medical research.
It was
their destructive policy, wars, and robbery that
provoked today's colossal surge in migration
flows. Millions of people suffer deprivation,
abuse, thousands die trying to get to the same
Europe.
Now
they are exporting bread from Ukraine. Where is
he going under the pretext of "providing food
security for the world's poorest countries"?
Where is it going? Everything goes to the same
European countries. There, five percent only
went to the poorest countries in the world.
Again, another swindle and outright deception.
The
American elite, in fact, uses the tragedy of
these people to weaken their competitors, to
destroy nation states. This also applies to
Europe, this also applies to the identity of
France, Italy, Spain and other countries with a
long history.
Washington is demanding more and more sanctions
against Russia, and most European politicians
meekly agree with this. They clearly understand
that the United States, pushing through the EU's
complete renunciation of Russian energy carriers
and other resources, is practically leading to
the de-industrialization of Europe, to
completely taking over the European market -
they understand everything, these elites are
European, they understand everything, but prefer
to serve the interests of others. This is no
longer servility, but a direct betrayal of their
peoples. But God bless them, that's their
business.
But
sanctions are not enough for the Anglo-Saxons,
they switched to sabotage - unbelievable, but
true - having organized explosions on the
international gas pipelines of the Nord Stream,
which run along the bottom of the Baltic Sea,
they actually began to destroy the pan-European
energy infrastructure. It is clear to everyone
who benefits from this. Who benefits, he did, of
course.
The US
dictate is based on brute force, on fist law.
Sometimes beautifully wrapped, sometimes without
any wrapper, but the essence is the same - fist
law. Hence the deployment and maintenance of
hundreds of military bases in all corners of the
world, the expansion of NATO, attempts to put
together new military alliances such as AUKUS
and the like. Active work is also underway to
create a military-political link between
Washington-Seoul-Tokyo. All those states that
possess or seek to possess genuine strategic
sovereignty and are capable of challenging
Western hegemony are automatically included in
the category of enemies.
It is
on these principles that the US and NATO
military doctrines are built, requiring nothing
less than total domination. The Western elites
present their neo-colonial plans in the same
hypocritical way, even with a pretense of
peacefulness, they talk about some kind of
containment, and such a crafty word wanders from
one strategy to another, but, in fact, means
only one thing: undermining any sovereign
centers of development.
We
have already heard about the containment of
Russia, China, Iran. I believe that other
countries of Asia, Latin America, Africa, the
Middle East, as well as current partners and
allies of the United States, are next in line.
We know that whatever they don’t like, they also
impose sanctions against their allies – first
against one bank, then against another; now
against one company, now against another. This
is the same practice, and will expand. They
target everyone, including our closest neighbors
- the CIS countries.
At the
same time, the West has clearly and has long
been wishful thinking. So, starting a sanctions
blitzkrieg against Russia, they believed that
once again they would be able to build the whole
world on their command. But, as it turned out,
such a rosy prospect excites far from everyone -
except perhaps complete political masochists and
admirers of other non-traditional forms of
international relations. Most states refuse to
salute, and choose a reasonable path of
cooperation with Russia.
The
West clearly did not expect such recalcitrance
from them. They just got used to acting
according to a pattern, taking everything
impudently, blackmail, bribery, intimidation,
and convince themselves that these methods will
work forever, as if they were ossified and
frozen in the past.
Such
self-confidence is a direct product not only of
the notorious concept of one's own exclusivity -
although this, of course, is simply surprising -
but also of a real hunger for information in the
West. They drowned the truth in an ocean of
myths, illusions and fakes, using prohibitively
aggressive propaganda, lying recklessly, like
Goebbels. The more incredible the lie, the
faster they will believe in it - that's how they
act, according to this principle.
But
people cannot be fed with printed dollars and
euros. It is impossible to feed with these
pieces of paper, and it is impossible to heat a
home with the virtual, inflated capitalization
of Western social networks. All this is
important, what I’m talking about, but what was
just said is no less important: you can’t feed
anyone with paper money - you need food, and you
won’t warm anyone with these inflated
capitalizations - you need energy.
Therefore, politicians in the same Europe have
to convince their fellow citizens to eat less,
wash less often, and dress warmer at home. And
those who begin to ask fair questions “actually,
why is that so?” – are immediately declared
enemies, extremists and radicals. They switch
arrows to Russia, they say: here, they say, who
is the source of all your troubles. Lie again.
What
do I want to highlight in particular? There is
every reason to believe that the Western elites
are not going to look for constructive ways out
of the global food and energy crisis, which
arose through their fault, precisely through
their fault, as a result of their many years of
policy long before our special military
operation in Ukraine, in the Donbass. They do
not intend to solve the problems of injustice
and inequality. There is a fear that they are
ready to use other recipes that are familiar to
them.
And
here it is worth recalling that the West emerged
from the contradictions of the early 20th
century through the First World War. The profits
from World War II allowed the United States to
finally overcome the consequences of the Great
Depression and become the largest economy in the
world, to impose on the planet the power of the
dollar as a global reserve currency. And the
overdue crisis of the 80s - and in the 80s of
the last century the crisis also aggravated -
the West largely overcame by appropriating the
legacy and resources of the Soviet Union that
was collapsing and collapsed in the end. It is a
fact.
Now,
in order to extricate themselves from another
tangle of contradictions, they need to break
Russia and other states that choose the
sovereign path of development at all costs in
order to plunder other people's wealth even more
and at this expense to close, plug their holes.
If this does not happen, I do not rule out that
they will try to completely bring the system to
a collapse, on which everything can be blamed,
or, God forbid, decide to use the well-known
formula “the war will write everything off”.
Russia
understands its responsibility to the world
community and will do everything to bring such
hotheads to their senses.
It is
clear that the current neo-colonial model is
ultimately doomed. But I repeat that her real
owners will cling to her to the end. They simply
have nothing to offer the world, except for the
preservation of the same system of robberies and
racketeering.
In
fact, they spit on the natural right of billions
of people, most of humanity, to freedom and
justice, to determine their own future on their
own. Now they have completely moved to a radical
denial of moral norms, religion, and family.
Let's
answer some very simple questions for ourselves.
I now want to return to what I said, I want to
address all the citizens of the country - not
only to those colleagues who are in the hall -
to all the citizens of Russia: do we want to
have, here, in our country, in Russia, instead
of mom and dad there was “parent number one”,
“number two”, “number three” - are they
completely crazy already there? Do we really
want perversions that lead to degradation and
extinction to be imposed on children in our
schools from the primary grades? To be drummed
into them that there are supposedly other
genders besides women and men, and to be offered
a sex change operation? Do we want all this for
our country and our children? For us, all this
is unacceptable, we have a different, our own
future.
I
repeat, the dictatorship of the Western elites
is directed against all societies, including the
peoples of the Western countries themselves.
This is a challenge for everyone. Such a
complete denial of man, the overthrow of faith
and traditional values, the suppression of
freedom acquires the features of a "reverse
religion" - outright Satanism. In the Sermon on
the Mount, Jesus Christ, denouncing the false
prophets, says: By their fruits you will know
them. And these poisonous fruits are already
obvious to people - not only in our country, in
all countries, including for many people and in
the West itself.
The
world has entered a period of revolutionary
transformations, they are of a fundamental
nature. New development centers are being
formed, they represent the majority - the
majority! - of the world community and are ready
not only to declare their interests, but also to
protect them, and see multipolarity as an
opportunity to strengthen their sovereignty,
which means to gain true freedom, a historical
perspective, their right to independent,
creative, original development, to a harmonious
process.
All
over the world, including in Europe and the
United States, as I said, we have many
like-minded people, and we feel, we see their
support. A liberation, anti-colonial movement
against unipolar hegemony is already developing
within the most diverse countries and societies.
His subjectivity will only grow. It is this
force that will determine the future
geopolitical reality.
Dear
friends!
Today
we are fighting for a just and free path, first
of all for ourselves, for Russia, for diktat,
despotism to remain forever in the past. I am
convinced that countries and peoples understand
that a policy based on the exclusivity of
anyone, on the suppression of other cultures and
peoples, is inherently criminal, that we must
turn this shameful page. The collapse of Western
hegemony that has begun is irreversible. And I
repeat again: it will not be the same as before.
The
battlefield to which fate and history have
called us is the battlefield for our people, for
great historical Russia.
(Applause.)
For great historical Russia, for future
generations, for our children, grandchildren and
great-grandchildren. We must protect them from
enslavement, from monstrous experiments that are
aimed at crippling their minds and souls.
Today
we are fighting so that it would never occur to
anyone that Russia, our people, our language,
our culture can be taken and erased from
history. Today, we need the consolidation of the
entire society, and such cohesion can only be
based on sovereignty, freedom, creation, and
justice. Our values are humanity, mercy and
compassion.
And I
want to end my speech with the words of a true
patriot Ivan Alexandrovich Ilyin: “If I consider
Russia my Motherland, then this means that I
love in Russian, contemplate and think, sing and
speak Russian; that I believe in the spiritual
strength of the Russian people. His spirit is my
spirit; his fate is my fate; his suffering is my
grief; its flowering is my joy.”
Behind
these words is a great spiritual choice, which
for more than a thousand years of Russian
statehood was followed by many generations of
our ancestors. Today, we are making this choice,
the citizens of the Donetsk and Lugansk People's
Republics, the residents of Zaporozhye and
Kherson regions have made this choice. They made
the choice to be with their people, to be with
the Motherland, to live its destiny, to win
together with it.
Behind
us is the truth, behind us is Russia!
(Applause.)
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