MOSCOW, November 20. /TASS/: The initiatives of US congressmen to end recognition of Vladimir Putin as president of Russia if he is re-elected in 2024 indicate that Russian citizens made a correct choice in 2018 and it’s not up to the US Congress to decide who will become the country’s leader, State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin wrote on his Telegram channel on Saturday.
"First of all, we do not meddle in American elections and one shouldn’t meddle in ours," he wrote. "Secondly, it’s not up to US congressmen to decide who can and who cannot be the president of our country. The citizens of the Russian Federation will decide," the Duma speaker added.
According to him, the resolution drafts to end Putin’s recognition as president being proposed in the US are "the best evaluation of the soundness of path and choice" made by the country’s citizens when they elected him as president. Such an initiative, according to the speaker, "yet again indicates that the US does not want a strong Russia." "They are doing everything to weaken us and then destroy. For this, they need a change of power here," he added.
"Those who today approved resolutions, yesterday were delighted with [Mikhail] Gorbachev, applauded to [Boris] Yeltsin," the speaker pointed out, noting that then the Russians endured trials "because of the weakness of the country’s leadership and the betrayal of elites who were oriented not towards national interests at all."
"At the same time, Washington has not fulfilled a single promise made after the disintegration of the USSR," the Duma speaker added. "Instead of aid and investments - sanctions and blockades, instead of peace and friendship - NATO approached our borders. If our country was weak and the president could have been controlled from overseas, there wouldn’t be threats and the unrecognition of elections," he asserted.
Earlier, US Congressmen Steve Cohen (Democrat, Tennessee), along with Joe Wilson (Republican, South Carolina) introduced a Congressional Resolution to the House of Representatives to end recognition of Vladimir Putin as president of Russia if he remains in office beyond the end of his current term on May 7, 2024.
