Putin: Russia too big to be sanctioned

WASHINGTON — Efforts by Western countries to isolate Russia failed, and they were doomed to fail, considering the country’s vast territory and role on the international arena, Russian President Vladimir Putin said in an interview to Fox News on Monday.

“I think you see for yourself that these efforts failed. And they were never bound to succeed. I mean, take a look at the scale, at the sheer size of it, the importance of it in terms of the international security and the economy, take its contribution into the global energy market. It’s too big to be sanctioned and isolated,” he said.

“Speaking about the things that do unite us, though, and of the things that require our joint efforts, it brings us to the idea that such attempts to fight one another should be ended,” the president added.

He went on to say that Moscow and Washington should “rather look for ways to… address common issues and challenges, to overcome these common concerns.”

“So I think that this is the beginning of the path. This is a start. We did make a good start,” Putin said, referring to his summit with US President Donald Trump in Helsinki on Monday.

Monday’s meeting in Helsinki was the first full-format Putin-Trump talks. Before that, they met twice — in July and November 2017 — on the sidelines of major international forums. TASS