Russia’s President Vladimir Putin has said Western countries have no friends but only interests.
President Putin made the statement during the Eastern Economic Forum at a forum in the Russian city of Vladivostok on Tuesday.
He made the remarks while responding to questions from a moderator at the event, as the fight between Russian troops and Ukraine troops continue across Kyiv and other regions.
In 1956, the Soviet Union invaded Hungary, and invaded Czechoslovakia in 1968 after a series of mass protests and the demand for greater freedoms
President Putin was asked to give a response to those who say the Soviet Union acted like a colonial power when it moved tanks into Budapest in 1956 and Prague in 1968
The Russian President said: “We acknowledged a long time ago that that part of the Soviet policy was mistaken and only led to tension in relations. One must not do anything in foreign policy that comes in direct contradiction with the interests of other peoples.”
He added that countries in the West, especially the United States of America (U.S.), were presently taking after the Soviets to make the same mistake.
Putin said, “They put pressure on their allies, so-called partners. They have no friends. They only have interests. That is a continuation of a well-known British formula.”
According to the director of the Petofi Literary Museum, Szilard Demeter, “inhumane dictatorships will still be inhumane and dictatorships, even if someone starts to portray them in a positive light.”
The Foreign Minister of Hungary Péter Szijjártó commented: “There are issues in Hungarian history on which we won’t even start a debate with anyone. The Revolutionaries of 1956 are our heroes.”
The Russian President, who has been under strong criticism from the West after the country invaded Ukraine in 2022, has been looking to increase the European country’s impact on the African continent.
Putin said in March that strengthening ties between Russia and Africa was a top priority for the Kremlin.
In a televised speech at a conference on Russian-African relations, Putin emphasised that his nation has always given collaboration with African states precedence and will do so in the future.
In late May, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba appealed to African countries to reconsider their neutral stance regarding the ongoing conflict between both countries.
Speaking in Addis Ababa, the capital of Ethiopia, Kuleba expressed disappointment over the decision of some African nations to abstain and called for their diplomatic support in the face of Russian aggression.