Europe 1 with AFP / Photo credit: DMITRY ASTAKHOV / POOL / AFP 16:27 p.m., December 17, 2023

On Sunday, during an address to the ruling party, his first campaign speech ahead of the March 2024 presidential election, Vladimir Putin promised to make Russia a "sovereign power". The Russian president announced last week his intention to run for a fifth term in the March 2024 presidential election.

President Vladimir Putin vowed on Sunday to make Russia a "sovereign power" in an address to the ruling party, his first campaign speech ahead of the March 2024 presidential election. "Russia will be a sovereign and self-sufficient power, otherwise it will no longer exist at all," Putin told senior United Russia party officials at a congress in support of his candidacy.

"Russia cannot, like some countries, give up its sovereignty in exchange for a few sausages and become someone's satellite," he said in an apparent reference to Ukraine.

"Historical Tasks"

Accusing the West of seeking to "collapse the Russian economy and social sphere", he called on the country's "patriotic forces" to combine their efforts in the face of the "historic tasks" that await Moscow. "Together with all the Russian people, let us defend Russia's sovereignty, freedom, security, everything we hold dear, our history, our culture, our values and our traditions," Putin said.

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The Russian president, whose country is under a series of Western sanctions and who sent his soldiers to storm Ukraine in 2022, announced last week his intention to run for president in March 2024 for a fifth term. There is little doubt about his re-election, as any real opposition has been methodically eradicated in Russia in recent years. The leader of United Russia, former President Dmitry Medvedev, said on Sunday that his party would "do everything" to support Vladimir Putin's candidacy.

He said Russia had "been able to withstand colossal pressure" from the West. "The response to the actions of our adversaries has been the resilience and unity of Russian society," he said. According to the ex-president, a victory for Vladimir Putin in March 2024 will allow him to "finally gain the upper hand over the forces that threaten the security and sovereignty" of the country.