(Czech) President Zeman calls for lifting of Russia sanctions at event organized by Putin associate [View all]

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Source: Radio Praha

Czech President Miloš Zeman has come under criticism for denouncing sanctions against Russia – in Russian – at an event organised by a close associate of Vladimir Putin’s. Mr. Zeman described the conflict in Ukraine as a civil war and said the situation was a mere “flu” compared to the threat of Islamic terrorism.

The Czech president addressed the Dialogue of Civilizations conference on the Greek island of Rhodes in fluent Russian. The annual event is organized by a Vienna-based group called World Public Forum. Its president is the Russian oligarch Vladimir Yakunin, who has himself been targeted by US sanctions.

In his 17-minute address on Friday, Mr Zeman criticized the sanctions imposed by the EU and US on Russian over Moscow’s support for pro-Russian rebels in Ukraine and its annexation of Crimea.

“We have to remove the sanctions which are not only useless but they cause a reverse effect than their authors hoped to achieve. We need to develop a dialogue based on the exchange of people, commodities and capital as well as completely uncensored information,” Mr Zeman said.

Read more: http://www.radio.cz/en/section/curraffrs/president-zeman-calls-for-lifting-of-russia-sanctions-at-event-organized-by-putin-associate

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Pity the poor Czechs. A president who lets Russian oligarchs fly him out to a staged "conference" in order to kiss Kremlin ass--less than 3 decades after the Czechs kicked the Russians out of their country.