"This (the conflict in Ukraine) could have been avoided if our work with the administration, the Biden administration, had been structured differently, if Ukraine had not been turned into a destructive tool in the wrong hands, if the North Atlantic Bloc had not been used for this, which was advancing towards our borders, if Ukraine had remained in after all, their independence, their real sovereignty," Putin said at a meeting of the Valdai International Discussion Club.
The Valdai International Discussion Club is an association of leading foreign and Russian experts in the fields of political science, economics, history, and international relations. The club was established in 2004. It owes its name to the place of the first conference, which took place in Veliky Novgorod, near Lake Valdai. ria.ru.
