Russian President Vladimir Putin, in an interview broadcast on Monday, said he did not want to divide the EU as he prepared to visit Austria in his first bilateral trip to a west European nation in almost a year.
“We do not pursue the objective of dividing anything or anyone in the EU,” Putin told broadcaster ORF. “We are far more interested in the EU being united and flourishing, because the EU is our most important trading and economic partner.”
Putin, who has not made a bilateral visit to a west European nation since he went to Finland in July last year, is to meet government and business leaders in Austria on a trip that officially marks 50 years since the two nations’ energy firms, Gazprom and OMV, first signed a gas supply deal.
Photo: AP
He is to attend a business conference with envoys from both nations, but the issue of EU sanctions, imposed on Russia because of its support for pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine, is likely weigh on any official talks he has.
Moscow’s ties with EU nations remain strained after Russia’s annexation of Crimea, its involvement in Syria and eastern Ukraine, and the poisoning of a former Russian double agent in Britain.
London has blamed the nerve agent poisoning of Sergei Skripal and his daughter on Russia, but Moscow has denied any involvement.
Austria’s coalition government of conservatives and the pro-Putin far right was in a minority of EU governments that did not expel any Russian diplomats over the Skripal case and Austria, despite its membership of the EU, points to its history of neutrality and its relatively warm relations with Russia.
Moscow wants the EU to lift sanctions, but the bloc has linked that to progress on the ground, which has not happened.
Austria, which takes over the rotating EU presidency next month, has said it wants to act as a bridge between east and west.
The leader of the far-right Freedom Party, which has a cooperation agreement with Putin’s United Russia, over the weekend called for sanctions to be lifted, but Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz and his conservatives, who control Austria’s EU policy, have said Austria would toe the EU line.
“We decide pragmatically whether to cooperate with someone politically,” Putin said when asked in the interview about United Russia’s ties with far-right parties. “We try to work with those who publicly express the wish themselves to work with us.”
CONFRONTATION: The water cannon attack was the second this month on the Philippine supply boat ‘Unaizah May 4,’ after an incident on March 5 The China Coast Guard yesterday morning blocked a Philippine supply vessel and damaged it with water cannons near a reef off the Southeast Asian country, the Philippines said. The Philippine military released video of what it said was a nearly hour-long attack off the Second Thomas Shoal (Renai Shoal, 仁愛暗沙) in the contested South China Sea, where Chinese ships have unleashed water cannons and collided with Philippine vessels in similar standoffs in the past few months. The China Coast Guard and other vessels “once again harassed, blocked, deployed water cannons, and executed dangerous maneuvers” against a routine rotation and resupply mission to
GLOBAL COMBAT AIR PROGRAM: The potential purchasers would be limited to the 15 nations with which Tokyo has signed defense partnership and equipment transfer deals Japan’s Cabinet yesterday approved a plan to sell future next-generation fighter jets that it is developing with the UK and Italy to other nations, in the latest move away from the country’s post-World War II pacifist principles. The contentious decision to allow international arms sales is expected to help secure Japan’s role in the joint fighter jet project, and is part of a move to build up the Japanese arms industry and bolster its role in global security. The Cabinet also endorsed a revision to Japan’s arms equipment and technology transfer guidelines to allow coproduced lethal weapons to be sold to nations
Thousands of devotees, some in a state of trance, gathered at a Buddhist temple on the outskirts of Bangkok renowned for sacred tattoos known as Sak Yant, paying their respects to a revered monk who mastered the practice and seeking purification. The gathering at Wat Bang Phra Buddhist temple is part of a Thai Wai Khru ritual in which devotees pay homage to Luang Phor Pern, the temple’s formal abbot, who died in 2002. He had a reputation for refining and popularizing the temple’s Sak Yant tattoo style. The idea that tattoos confer magical powers has existed in many parts of Asia
ON ALERT: A Russian cruise missile crossed into Polish airspace for about 40 seconds, the Polish military said, adding that it is constantly monitoring the war to protect its airspace Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, and the western region of Lviv early yesterday came under a “massive” Russian air attack, officials said, while a Russian cruise missile breached Polish airspace, the Polish military said. Russia and Ukraine have been engaged in a series of deadly aerial attacks, with yesterday’s strikes coming a day after the Russian military said it had seized the Ukrainian village of Ivanivske, west of Bakhmut. A militant attack on a Moscow concert hall on Friday that killed at least 133 people also became a new flash point between the two archrivals. “Explosions in the capital. Air defense is working. Do not