MOSCOW, May 17. /TASS/. Western politicians speculated on people's natural concern about climate issues, downplaying the importance of traditional energy and overestimating the role of alternative energy, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at a meeting on the development of the oil industry on Tuesday.

"In fact, the so-called political class in the West began to speculate on the absolutely natural concern of many people on the planet with climate issues. It is quite obvious that, for domestic political reasons, they began to overestimate the possibilities of alternative energy and underestimate the importance of traditional energy, all its sources, including hydrocarbons," he said.

Putin stressed that this constant abuse "was of a very specific nature."

"You know this better than anyone else: they [the Western authorities] limited bank financing. They filed all sorts of far-fetched lawsuits against companies and company management and as far as I know, they are still doing it," he explained.

Putin recalled that Western countries do not allocate plots of land necessary for new projects, limit opportunities for the development of transport, create problems in freight and other areas that are necessary to ensure investment in the industry "timely and in the right amount."

"Today all this is the main, basic component of the problems emerging in the global energy industry and, above all, of course, in hydrocarbons," the head of the Russian state said.