In a rare statement, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov referred to Western reports about the illness of Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to what he said in a televised interview on Sunday, May 29, 2022.
The news came after the Times claimed that Russian President Vladimir Putin had leukemia and had undergone back surgery shortly before the order to invade Ukraine.
But Sergei Lavrov called the news of the Russian president’s illness a rumor, saying there was no sign that he was ill.
Russian President Vladimir Putin, who has led Russia for more than two decades, turns 70 this October.
“I do not think rational people can see the signs of illness or disease in this person,” Lavrov told France’s TF1 channel, noting that President Putin regularly appears in public.
A Russian study published last April found that a cancer surgeon had met 35 times in four years at Putin’s residence on the Black Sea.
“The president has a lot of doctors who take care of his health, and it is likely that Putin underwent serious surgery years ago,” he said.
The Times quoted the New Line magazine as saying that a wealthy Russian man close to the Kremlin mentioned this in a recorded conversation with a Western investor in mid-March and that the president had gone “crazy”. Sued. “We all hope for Putin’s death,” he said.
The Russian billionaire went on to say that Vladimir Putin had destroyed the Russian economy, the Ukrainian economy and many others, “the problem is in his head, a madman can turn the world upside down.”
The Times also noted that speculation about Putin’s health arose after he was seen limping several times, and in another meeting last April with Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, he was holding a table to lean on. Giving was seen.
He added that Putin was wrapped in a heavy woolen blanket during last week’s Victory Day parade, which sparked further speculation.
He added that Shoigu had previously offered alternative treatment to Vladimir Putin during his visit to Siberia, and that the Russian president would not go anywhere unless he was accompanied by three doctors, including a cancer specialist.
Lavrov stressed in a television interview that what he described as the “liberation” of the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine was Russia’s “top priority.”
In defense of Russia’s military operation, which took place more than three months after the invasion, he reiterated that his goal was to “disarm” the neighbor. He reiterated the Kremlin’s ridiculous stance that Russia was fighting a “neo-Nazi regime.”
Asked about the human cost of the war, which has seen devastating artillery and missile strikes on some urban areas, Lavrov stressed that Russian troops are “subject to strict orders to avoid attacks and attacks on civilian infrastructure.”
At least 4,031 civilians have been killed, 4,735 wounded and an unknown number of militants killed or wounded since the Russian invasion began on February 24, according to the United Nations.
More than 14 million people have fled their homes and cities and towns are in ruins.
Due to the focus of the fighting in Donbas, a mineral belt consisting of the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, separatists in the two historically strong ties with Russia seceded from Ukraine in 2014 and are now working with Russian forces for full control. They are fighting. .
“Victory in the Donetsk and Luhansk regions, which are recognized by the Russian Federation as independent states, is an unconditional priority,” Lavrov told TF1.
But he added that it was up to the rest of Ukraine to make the people there “happy to return to power of a neo-Nazi regime that has proven at its core to be anti-Russian.”
Source: Lebanon Debate
