All news

Moscow empathizes with US regarding riots, but won’t allow them in Russia — Putin

"We are going to do our best to make sure it does not happen," the President said

GENEVA, June 16. /TASS/. Russia empathizes with the Americans regarding tragic consequences of the riots erupting after the murder of Afro-American George Floyd, but does not want anything similar to take place on its territory, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at the news conference after the Russia-US summit in Geneva on Wednesday.

"America has very recently faced extremely grave events after the well-known events, after the murder of an Afro-American and the establishment of the whole movement, Black Lives Matter. I am not going to comment on that now. I just want to say that what we saw were pogroms, law violations and so on. We empathize with the Americans and the people of the United States, but we do not want something like that to happen on our territory. And we are going to do our best to make sure it does not happen. And some sort of fear has nothing to do with it," he said.

"About who will be killed or thrown in jail - with political demands came people into the US Congress after the election. Criminal cases have been filed against 400 people, who face up to 20 years in prison, or maybe up to 25 years. They are accused of being domestic terrorists, are accused of a variety of other offenses. Seventy were arrested straightaway after those events, and only 30 of them are still in custody, but it is unclear on what basis. After all, nobody of the US officials informs us about it," the president said.

Putin added that several people died there. A woman was shot dead by a police officer on the spot although she was not threatening him with a gun.

"Many countries experience the same as ours. I want to underscore once more that we feel sympathy for what took place in the United States, but we do not want to let the same events happen to us," he stressed.