MOSCOW, May 17. /TASS/. The collective West will stop at nothing to prevent Russia from living the way it wants to, Kremlin Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said during the educational marathon conference New Horizons organized by the Russian Znanie (Knowledge) society.

"Sometimes it seems that the very existence of Russia is a significant irritant for the collective West and they will stop at nothing not to let us develop the way we want and live the way we want," he said.

The Kremlin official noted that during at least two decades Russia "has been developing, increasing the rates of development, was trying to withstand a crisis, used crises for renewal, for improvement, was developing and becoming better in order for new horizons and opportunities to open for future generations."

"And we stood up for our interests. Since a state, just as an individual, has its interests. And if the state is not persistent, if it does not display a principled stance with regards to the main issues of existence, this state loses its independence, self-reliance, sovereignty, the ability to think independently, to make decisions, to go where it wants to. And we have been doing this during several decades," Putin’s press secretary said.

He noted that Russia tried to "get through to the collective West, [we] said that we didn’t like it when your missiles and cannons were getting closer to our borders, when you expand NATO, we feel this danger and ask you not to do this, we are inviting you to agree on new security principles on our shared continent, we are asking to agree on how we all will exist peacefully together, so there won’t be discriminatory measures in the economy, in trade."

"Yet we weren’t exactly heard because of a very strong competition in the world and in general, the collective West is shaped like a pyramid with the US at the top, the command center is precisely there," the spokesman added.