SOCHI, Nov. 7. /TASS/. George H. W. Bush in a private conversation called it a huge mistake for the United States to boycott the 1980 Moscow Olympics, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at the Valdai Discussion Club’s plenary session.

"When I talked to his father [George W. Bush’s - TASS], also a former US president, he was no longer president at that time, he told me sincerely and calmly something like this: ‘We made a big mistake when we boycotted the Olympic Games in Moscow. Then Russia started doing the same with regard to the Olympic Games in our country. Nonsense’. This is what he told me personally," the Russian leader said.

"All this continues in the same fashion. Under outside pressure, the International Olympic Committee has turned into circus buffoonery. They have commercialized the Olympic movement completely and are ruining it with their own hands," Putin added.