MOSCOW, March 11. /TASS/. With the passage of time many world leaders have agreed with the ideas of Vladimir Putin’s Munich speech, although their initial reaction was anger, Russia’s president told TASS in an interview for the project entitled "20 Questions with Vladimir Putin".
"No," Putin said when asked if his speech at the Munich Security conference on February 10, 2007 was an exaggeration. "Now they repeat everything I said. For example, the German leaders. They almost repeat it word for word…"
He remarked that at a certain point the Western leaders got angry, because in their opinion it was "quite rude" and pronounced "at the wrong time."
"And what did I say? I said that it is inadmissible that one country, the United States, extends its jurisdiction beyond its national borders. Today, say, the German leadership says exactly that, that it is inadmissible that the United States imposes secondary sanctions, i.e. on companies, that have no relation to the United States, trying to prevent them from pursuing their national interests," Putin recalled.
Asked if he agreed with the speculations that in geopolitical terms "Europe from Lisbon to Vladivostok" did not exist anymore, Putin replied that in fact it had never existed at all.
"Back in the day, de Gaulle spoke about a Europe from the Atlantic to the Urals. Then I extended that idea a little, and started saying: why to the Urals, why not to the Pacific, to the Far East? I think it should be the goal," he said.
Munich speech
On February 10, 2007 Putin addressed the Munich Security Conference with a speech to warn of the risks of disproportionate use of force in international affairs. Also, he pointed to the drift away from international law towards military build-ups and another arms race. Putin drew attention to the problem of nuclear disarmament, militarization of space, and NATO’s eastward expansion.
The Russian leader’s speech had a resounding effect: for the first time ever Russia explained its approach to world diplomacy so sternly and straightforwardly. Many political scientists believe that the ideas of Putin’s speech have not lost their relevance over years and that many negative trends the Russian leader warned of then have merely grown stronger.
Episode 11 of the video interview is available at https://putin.tass.ru/en.