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Russia's Putin gives upbeat end-of-year assessment
December 19, 2002
AFP

President Vladimir Putin gave an upbeat end-of-year assessment Thursday highlighting economic growth as he faced the nation in a live broadcast that he used also to flatly rule out talks with separatists in Chechnya.

Putin looked composed and collected as he faced some sharp questioning from Russians from across the country who complained about everything from a lack of heating in the winter to low pensions and expensive medicines.

Seated next to a laptop computer and flanked by two television presenters, the Russian leader dashed off a list of statistics pointing to faster-than-expected economic growth and slowing inflation. Then he patiently answered Russians' questions about their local complaints, at times appearing well-briefed on subjects as minutious as the hardships of a Siberian grade-school currenctly without heating.

The Kremlin had said that none of the questions had been arranged in advance.

The session continued considerably longer than the orginally-allotted 90 minutes as Putin faced televised crowds standing on local squares in the freezing cold.

"In general, we can say that the country became richer, and although maybe just a little bit, and the country's social conditions have improved," Putin said in the second such end-of-year interview with ordinary Russians.

"Russia is developing, and developing energetically," he said. "That is the main result for the year."

Putin's approval rating has soared to unprecedented heights, registering at over 80 percent, and he seems an overwhelming favorite to win re-election in 2004.

As he again demonstrated Thursday, Putin has displayed great skills in image management since inheriting the presidency from his predecessor Boris Yeltsin, with ratings unhurt even by October's Moscow theater hostage crisis in which 129 civilians died.

Putin spoke somberly about the incident, which demonstrated that guerrillas from Chechnya -- demanding an end to the 39-month war -- could penetrate into the heart of Moscow with large quantities of guns and bombs.

"We will long remember the crisis on Dubrovka," he said of the three-day standoff. And those who lost relatives -- they will remember the crisis forever," he added.

But he urged the nation to remain united in the face of the threat of terrorism, putting the blame for such actions on hired mercenaries from abroad -- "bandits," he called them -- rather than residents of Chechnya.

Putin took pains to distinguish between the guerrilla leadership, which he again identified as "terrorist" who could be allowed to peace talks, and other citizens of the turbulent North Caucasus republic.'

"A poor peace is always better than a good war. But the question is, who do we hold talks with?" Putin demanded.

"We have already had talks once," he said in reference to a 1996 agreement that ended the first Chechen war and left Russia's tumultuous Caucasus republic with de facto independence.

"Within a year following the election, they lost control over Chechnya and they became the tools of bandits whose aims have nothing to do with the Chechen people. Their aim is to set up a caliphate," he said.

"Should we be holding talks with those people again?" asked Putin. "No, this will not happen."

He stressed that the military phase of the operation in Chechnya has been completed, complimenting the army for doing "a good job."

Putin added that only professional soldiers, rather than young and inexperienced conscripts, will be stationed in the republic to keep order starting with the spring or the summer of 2004.

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