Video record
Transcript
Today President Vladimir Putin met with representatives from the European Jewish Congress.
The President stated that Russia enthusiastically supports an idea of creating a pan-European programme to fight xenophobia and anti-Semitism. Putin also thanked the meeting’s participants for openly confronting ongoing attempts to rewrite history and whitewash Nazism in some Eastern European nations.
Putin: Some of the things we have come up against in several Eastern European countries have provoked open astonishment and incomprehension. Latvian and Estonian authorities are openly conspiring to glorify the Nazis and their accomplices. The European Union, however, has failed to take note of these facts. Since Estonia declared independence it has not prosecuted a single Nazi war criminal. In Latvia every March 16, officials allow neo-Nazi marches commemorating the “anniversary” of the founding of the Latvian Legion Waffen-SS. We also see a strange, almost hypocritical position of some European organizations regarding the removal of the Soldier-Liberator Monument in Tallinn. I would like to express my gratitude to the Jewish organizations in the Baltic States who have straightforwardly, honestly and openly declared their position on this issue.
