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Twenty-five years ago, Putin addressed the Bundestag mostly in German and called Russia a ‘friendly country’

Source: Meduza

Twenty-five years ago, on September 25, 2001, Vladimir Putin addressed the Bundestag during his first presidential term. In the speech, which he delivered primarily in German, Putin, then 48, repeatedly spoke about what Russia and Germany had in common. As the German newspaper Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung wrote in 2021, the speech remains popular among Germans to this day. Among other things, Putin said that Russia was a friendly country opposed to war. Thirteen years later, in 2014, Russia annexed Crimea and began the war in the Donbas. In 2022, it launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine.

Cover photo: Fritz Reiss / AP / Scanpix / LETA

Twenty-five years ago, Putin addressed the Bundestag mostly in German and called Russia a ‘friendly country’

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Twenty-five years ago, Putin addressed the Bundestag mostly in German and called Russia a ‘friendly country’

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