Russia planning to attack NATO? President Vladimir Putin says 'no ...

In addition to rejecting Biden's remark he called the US President's remark “complete nonsense" and regarded it as an attempt to justify his “mistaken policy" on Russia, reported Reuters citing an interview published by Rossiya state television on Sunday.

Notably, the war in Ukraine has triggered the deepest crisis in Moscow's relations with the West since the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis. Amid the deepening crisis, US President Joe Biden had warned last year that a confrontation between NATO and Russia would trigger World War Three. 

US President Joe Biden had made these remarks in a plea to Republicans to convince them not to block further military aid earlier this month. In the plea, Biden had warned that if Putin was victorious over Ukraine then the Russian leader would not stop and would attack a NATO country, reported Reuters.

On being asked about the US claim on the Kremlin's plan to attack NATO in the interview, Russian President Vladimir Putin said, “It is complete nonsense - and I think President Biden understands that."  He also added that Biden appeared to be trying to justify his own "mistaken policy" on Russia.

"Russia has no reason, no interest - no geopolitical interest, neither economic, political nor military - to fight with NATO countries," Putin said.

The U.S.-led NATO alliance was founded in 1949 to provide Western security against the Soviet Union. After the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union, it was enlarged to include some former Soviet and Warsaw Pact countries.

On Sunday, Russian President Vladimir Putin vowed to make Russia "sovereign and self-sufficient" in the face of the West, in his first campaign speech before a March vote to extend his long rule until at least 2030, according to an AFP report.

Putin is all set to fight the election for his fifth term with no real opposition that will come just over two years since he launched war against Ukraine. The 71-year-old came to power in 2000, with a whole generation in Russia unable to remember life without him.

He is expected to secure another term for at least 2030 and firm his chances to stay in power until 2036.  "We must remember and never forget and tell our children: Russia will be either a sovereign, self-sufficient state, or it will not be there at all," Putin said during a congress of the ruling United Russia party, reported AFP.

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Published: 17 Dec 2023, 09:46 PM IST