Monday, September 28, 2015

Obama and Putin at the U.N.

President Obama Addresses the 70th United Nations General Assembly. Video. White House.gov, September 28, 2018. YouTube. Also at PBS News Hour. Transcript.










Transcript Excerpt:

RUSSIAN PRESIDENT VLADIMIR PUTIN: We are all different and we should respect that. Now one has to conform to a single development model that someone has recognised as the only right one. We should all remember what our past has taught us.

We also remember certain episodes from the history of the Soviet Union, social experiments for export, attempts to push for changes with other countries based on ideological preferences, which often lead to tragic consequences. And to degradation rather than progress.

It seems that far from learning from the mistakes of others, everyone keeps repeating them. And so the export of revolutions, this time of so-called democratic ones, continues. It was enough to look at the situation in the Middle East and North Africa, as was mentioned by a previous speaker. Certainly political and social problems in this region have been piling up for a long time and people there wish for changes, naturally.

But how did it actually turn out?

Rather than bringing about reforms and addressing foreign interference, it resulted in a brazen destruction of national institutions and lifestyles.

Instead of the triumph of democracy and progress, we got violence, poverty and social division.

And nobody cares about about human rights, including the rights to life.

To the people that have caused this commotion, do you realise what you have done?

But I am afraid that no-one will answer that.

Policies based on the belief of self-exceptionism have never been abandoned. It is now obvious that the power vacuum created in some countries in the Middle East and North Africa, and the emergence of violent areas that were immediately filled with extremists and terrorists...


Putin’s UN speech: Big on ideas, short on details. By Dmitry Polikanov. Russia Direct, September 28, 2015.

Obama and Putin Clash at U.N. on Mideast Crisis. By Michael R. Gordon and Gardiner Harris. New York Times, September 28, 2015.