Vladimir Putin Chides Turkey, Praises Trump and Talks Up Russia’s Economy
By ANDREW E. KRAMER

MOSCOW — With his customary swagger and salty language, President Vladimir V. Putin held forth on a sweeping array of topics in his traditional year-end news conference on Thursday, even throwing in a glowing assessment of Donald J. Trump.

Mr. Putin drew applause from the crowd of journalists when he lashed out at Turkey for having shot down a Russian bomber, daring the Turks to try it again with Russia’s advanced air defense system in place.

Using a crude expression to describe the Turks as ingratiating themselves with Washington, he said perhaps they “wanted to lick the Americans in a certain place.”

The Russian leader was alternately pugnacious and conciliatory during the news conference, which was more than three hours long. In years past, he has had sharp words for Washington, but this time he praised the efforts of Secretary of State John Kerry to find a political solution to the war in Syria.

Mr. Putin also veered close to an admission that Russian soldiers had fought in the war in eastern Ukraine, saying, “We never said there were no people there solving certain questions, including in the military sphere,” but he denied that they were on active duty with the regular army. “Get a sense of that distinction,” he said.

He even gave a few hints of his closely guarded family life, talking proudly of his two grown daughters, who he said were living in Russia and “taking the first steps of their careers.”

Mr. Putin likes to throw in a few surprises on these occasions, as he did two years ago by announcing the release of the imprisoned oil tycoon, Mikhail B. Khodorkovsky. This year, he rose to the defense of Sepp Blatter, the embattled president of soccer’s world governing body, FIFA, who is under criminal investigation for corruption, saying Mr. Blatter should be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.

And he even inserted himself into the Republican presidential primary contest in the United States, speaking highly of Mr. Trump in remarks after the news conference ended.

“There is no doubt that he is a very bright and talented man,” the Russian leader said. “It is not our business to assess his merits; that is up to the U.S. voters. But he is an absolute leader of the presidential race.”

Beneath the pyrotechnics, Mr. Putin seemed most concerned with driving home the point to his domestic audience that Russia’s battered economy had bottomed out, an indication that Russia’s recession had his full attention.

Peppered with dozens of questions, Mr. Putin lingered, as he did at last year’s session, on those that allowed him to reassure Russians that their living standards were not imperiled.

He went out of his way to say that Russia’s economy had hit bottom this year, and that it was now bouncing back — though independent economists and even Russia’s central bank, in a report released this month, have contested that view.

At times, Mr. Putin sugarcoated grim economic news Russians were bound to discover in any case. While the government might soon lift the retirement age to save money, that is cause for celebration, he said, because Russians are now living longer — to an average age of 71.

Mr. Putin backpedaled on his prediction a year ago that Russia would pull out of its current slump within two years, and blamed the tumble in oil prices. “After this fall in prices in energy resources, all the indicators slipped,” he said.

Despite the recession, Mr. Putin’s popularity remains extraordinarily high, with support above 80 percent in some polls. While the economy is biting at home, even as Mr. Putin pursues a swaggering foreign policy, the hardship has not yet translated into widespread political discontent.

Surveys and the answers to questions posed to focus groups show that the pillars of Mr. Putin’s popularity shifted in early 2014, just before the current downturn. Russians now say they admire Mr. Putin more for a role as a “protector” from external threats than for the role of “provider,” a study by an influential Russian sociologist, Mikhail E. Dmitriyev, concluded this year.

Over the years, these events have provided a chronicle of Mr. Putin’s foreign policy thinking as it grew progressively anti-interventionist.

In 2008, he complained bitterly about the United States’ backing independence for Kosovo, and railed about Washington’s propensity to intervene in countries’ internal affairs where and when it sees fit. “We are told all the time, ‘Kosovo is a special case,’” Mr. Putin said. “It is all lies. There is no special case, and everybody understands it perfectly well.”

He propounded the same anti-interventionist theme in later years in the case of Libya, where he was embittered at having been misled into supporting a “humanitarian” intervention that ended up in what he saw as a disastrous exercise in regime change.

“No matter how they explained their position, the state is falling apart,” he said in 2012. “Interethnic, interclan and intertribal conflicts continue.” He added, “And you want us to constantly repeat these mistakes in other countries?”

He argued against intervention by outside powers in Syria as well, adding that Russia was “not concerned with the fate” of President Bashar al-Assad’s regime. “Of course, changes are being demanded, but it’s something else that concerns — what will happen next?”

Mr. Putin brushed aside a question about the cost to Russia’s struggling economy of the bombing campaign in Syria. It would be paid for, he said, out of the Defense Ministry’s training budget.

“It’s hard to imagine a better training drill,” he said of the bombing in Syria.

Since Turkey shot down a Russian warplane that it said had violated its airspace, Mr. Putin has engaged in a war of words with the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and ordered a number of retaliatory measures. On Thursday, he made clear that Russia has made Syria a no-fly zone for Turkish airplanes.

“Turkey used to violate Syrian airspace all the time,” Mr. Putin said. “Let them try and fly there now,” he said, noting that Russia’s most advanced air-defense system, the S-400, can hit any target in Syria.

Russia under Mr. Putin has deployed its military in several countries, and at one point on Thursday the president suffered a slip of the tongue in answering a question about Georgia, where Russia fought a war in 2008 and later recognized two separatist regions.

“Concerning the territorial integrity of Ukraine, ah, excuse me, of Georgia. … ” he said, going on to say that the breakup of Georgia was the fault of that country’s former leaders, not of Russia.

Speaking about his daughters, he said that they “have never lived in the limelight” but that they speak three European languages that they use “in their daily work.” He did not directly deny reports published this year that the pair held jobs at Russian universities.

「川普傑出有才華」 普亭準備合作

俄羅斯總統普亭十七日舉行年終記者會，表示希望與下任美國總統合作，並以「傑出、有才華」形容美國共和黨總統參選人川普。普亭在三小時的記者會中還說，不指望改善俄國與土耳其的冰凍關係，另表示俄國經濟已走出谷底，還罕見地提及兩個女兒。

普亭說：「川普非常傑出、愛炫，毫無疑問相當能幹。論斷他的德行的不應該是我們，而是美國選民，但他肯定是總統大選中的領先者。」普亭說，「俄國已準備好與下任美國總統合作，無論美國人民選擇了誰」。

川普民調遙遙領先，但曾口出要禁止穆斯林入境的狂言。普亭說：「談到國內政治，他的說話風格和拉抬人氣的方式，與俄國無關。」

川普說希望與俄國建立更深層、緊密的雙邊關係。對此，普亭說：「我們怎能不歡迎呢？我們當然歡迎。」

經濟方面，俄國去年兼併克里米亞後遭西方制裁，盧布大跌加上油價下滑，讓俄國今年經濟預估萎縮百分之四，為全球金融危機以來之最大的衰退幅度。

普亭尚未表態三年後是否競選連任，但藉此向選民保證，「俄國經濟已經度過危機，至少已度過危機的最嚴重時期，出現回穩徵兆」。民調顯示，普亭支持率為八成五，與十月的九成高點相距不遠。

談到俄土關係，普亭指控土耳其上月擊落俄國戰機是為了巴結討好美國。普亭說，他們可能認為俄國會因此離開（敘利亞），但俄國不是這樣的國家。俄國加入轟炸敘國行列，並支持美國草擬的聯合國安理會敘國協議，但堅持敘國人自己決定總統。俄國支持現任總統阿塞德，但西方國家要他下台。

普亭過去避談私人與家庭生活，今年卻罕見地說，兩個女兒「住在俄國，從未在俄國以外地區受教育」，處於職涯的起點，未涉入商業和政治。

原文參照：
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/18/world/europe/vladimir-putin-russia.html

紐約時報中文版翻譯：
http://cn.nytimes.com/world/20151218/c18putin/zh-hant/

Video：President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia said on Thursday that Moscow wanted to develop ties with U.S. and welcomed the Republican presidential candidate Donald J. Trump’s calls for deeper ties with Russia.
http://www.nytimes.com/video/us/politics/100000004099318/putin-praises-trump-in-year-end-address.html

Video：President Vladimir V. Putin said on Thursday that he saw no prospects of improving relations with the current Turkish leadership after it shot down a Russian warplane.
http://www.nytimes.com/video/world/europe/100000004099332/no-hope-to-fix-turkish-ties-putin-says.html

2015-12-18．聯合報．A17．國際．編譯陳韻涵