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Russian President Vladimir Putin's address to the Federal Assembly

West seeks unlimited power, while Russia defends its home — Putin

The Russian president stressed that Western countries have spent more than $150 billion on aiding and arming Kiev

MOSCOW, February 21. /TASS/. Russia is defending its home and people's lives, while the West seeks unlimited power, President Vladimir Putin said in his address to the Federal Assembly on Tuesday.

"Those who were planning a new attack on Donetsk and Donbass, and on Lugansk clearly understood that the next target was a strike on Crimea and Sevastopol, and we knew and understood that. And now Kiev is speaking openly about such far-reaching plans. Well, they have revealed themselves, revealed what we already knew very well," Putin said.

"We are protecting people's lives, our own home, while the goal of the West is unlimited power," Putin added.

The Russian president stressed that Western countries have spent more than $150 billion on aiding and arming Kiev. "By comparison, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, G7 countries allocated about $60 billion to help the world's poorest nations in 2020-2021. It’s clear, isn’t it? As many as $150 [billion] for the war, and $60 [billion] for the poorest countries, which they claim to be constantly taking care of. And this is all under the well-known demands of obedience on the part of the countries that are the recipients of this money," Putin stressed.

The flow of money for aid to Kiev is not thinning, the president noted.

Putin pointed out that at the recent Munich Security Conference, endless accusations were hurled against Russia, and one gets the impression that this was done only to make everyone forget what the West has done over the past decades. "And they were the ones who let the genie out of the bottle, who plunged entire regions into chaos," he pointed out. "According to estimates by American experts themselves, the wars - I want to draw your attention that we didn't come up with these figures, the Americans themselves provided them - the wars that the United States unleashed after 2001 have killed almost 900,000 people, and over 38 million have become refugees. All of this they are now just [trying] to erase from human memory, pretending that it never happened," the president stressed.

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