The president of Russia, Vladimir Putin, asked in Moscow today about the independence of Catalonia, said that he "doesn't want any European state to founder". He expressed support for Spain's position on the question and denied giving any support to the independence movement.
"We have an attitude of maximum respect for Spain, the Spanish people, Spanish history. We've got good relations, with historical roots. We're not interested at all in European countries splitting up one after the other", he told a press conference with international news agencies, including Spain's EFE. The Russian leader said that "in general, it's a myth that Russia wants a weak Europe" and that he's got a "good relationship with the king emeritus Juan Carlos and with the current king".
"Why would we need it? 40% of our gold and currency reserves is in euros. The European Union is our main economic partner. Why would we want everything to be convulsive there? It doesn't make sense," he said. "But they're looking for Russia's footprint. That refers to Spain too. Spain has to decide for itself how to live together with its problematic territories, with Catalonia, with the Basque Country, etc".
Putin argues that "so far they'd managed to solve these problems [...] through dialogue and agreements, with legally adopted decisions, through debate" and said he hopes this will remain the case in the future. "Above all", he added, "we support the stability, the preservation of territorial unity". "Life is more complex than some hypotheses collected even in well-known international law and we understand that perfectly".
During the press conference, he also said he was unaware that Spain's ambassador to Russia, Fernando Valderrama, had been summonsed by the foreign ministry over comments in an interview with a Spanish newspaper from Spanish foreign minister Josep Borrell. "Our ally is turning its back on us, our old enemy, Russia, is again saying 'here I am', and is a threat again, and China is appearing as a rival," the minister told El Periódico last month. "It's an absurd delusion to say that Russia is a threat," the president replied today.
Putin's statements today contradict the version published by certain Spanish newspaper claiming that Russia helped the independence movement online.