MOSCOW, April 14. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin has given credit to his US counterpart Barack Obama for recognizing the erroneous decisions on Libya.
"Firstly, this fact confirms once again that the current US president is a decent person," Putin said during the annual televised question-and-answer session on Thursday. "It’s very good that my colleague has the courage to make such statements - far from everyone can do that," the Russian president said, adding that this is the evidence of a strong personality.
According to Putin, cooperation with US President Barack Obama will continue until the end of his presidential term.
"He [Obama] is working, working actively, and I remain in contact with him, in contact with his administration, and I have ground to think that this will persist until the very last moment of his [presidential] term," Putin said.
The Russian leader recalled that, while being a senator, Barack Obama criticized the White House for Washington’s actions in Iraq, "but, unfortunately, during his tenure as president he made the mistakes he spoke about - in Libya."
"It’s very good that my colleague has the courage to make such statements - far from everyone can do that," the Russian president said, adding that this is the evidence of a strong personality.
"The bad thing is that this series of mistakes continues, because they nearly made the same mistake in Syria. We do not know how all this will end," the Russian leader said. He noted though that "recently we have been able to make this work [with the US on Syria] quite positive." "Intensive cooperation is underway between our militaries, intelligence agencies and foreign ministries to find a solution to the Syrian crisis. I hope this joint work will lead us to a joint positive result, the way it was in other areas recently," Putin said.
US President Barack Obama earlier told Fox News TV channel that the lack the "day after" plan in Libya was the worst mistake of his presidency. "Probably failing to plan for the day after what I think was the right thing to do in intervening in Libya," he said.
The popular unrest in Libya in February 2011 and the subsequent war that led to the overthrow and murder of the country’s leader Muammar Gaddafi split the country into two opposing camps. The war is raging between the pro-Islamist authorities in Tripoli and the government in the east regarded as legitimate by the world community.
In December 2011, the US cancelled a number of sanctions against Libya. All bank accounts of the government and Libya’s Central Bank, with few exceptions, were unblocked. Nevertheless, the US assets of the Gaddafi family remain blocked.