Another sign that the Russian president has lost favor and power in his own country is that he received a severe reprimand from the president of Tajikistan.
Emomali Rahmon, a fellow long-serving dictator who has been in charge of the 9 million-person Central Asian nation since 1994, used Putin’s problems at home and in Ukraine as an opportunity to confront him and express his true feelings at a meeting in the Kazakh city of Astana.
As a number of Central Asian presidents and representatives at the Commonwealth of Independent States Summit (CIS) looked on, a sad and awkward-looking Putin slouched back in his chair and endured the seven-minute diatribe.
Yes, we are tiny countries with populations between 100 and 200 million, but we have a rich history and culture that we cherish and strive to preserve. Rahmon exclaimed in a furious manner.
We want want to be appreciated, that’s all.
The leaders of Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan were there to see the humiliation.
Why do we have to grovel to get (Russia) to go to this pathetic conference in Tajikistan? Rahmon pointed at Putin and demanded while gesturing broadly.
“I told the Foreign Ministry to beg (Russia) to participate at least at the ministerial level, and I even spoke with you about it.” No, at the deputy ministerial level. Is a strategic partner what Tajikistan deserves?
Since his disaster in Ukraine, Putin’s ‘friends’ and ‘partners’ in Asia have openly betrayed him before because they now smell blood and feel weakness.
Chinese Premier Xi Xinping turned down dinner with Russian President Vladimir Putin at a conference in Samarkand, Uzbekistan, last month, while Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi cautioned Putin in front of the media that “now is not the time for war.”
Recep Tayyip Erdoan, the president of Turkey, further humiliated the Russian warmonger by having him wait in front of cameras for 30 seconds before approaching him before the meeting.
The meandering, off-the-cuff outburst from the Tajik dictator practically foretold Putin’s doom, accusing his Russian counterpart of repeating the same errors that brought the Soviet Union to its knees a century earlier.
Additionally, he lamented the entry of Russian businesspeople who made money off of the country’s natural riches while avoiding making investments there.
“We don’t want your money; we want to be treated with the respect we deserve.” We host your military installations, we comply with all of your requests, and we really strive to be the “strategic partners” that you represent to us.
But we never get strategic partner treatment! We don’t want to offend, but we want respect!
The fact that Putin’s former customers and vassals of tiny, poor dictatorships are turning against him, as well as large, powerful nations like India and China, tells its own tale even though he has continued to attempt to portray an outwardly positive outlook.
Since last month, when Ukraine began its fall push to free seized land, Putin’s misguided conflict in that country has taken a tragic turn.
His declaration of a limited mobilization and his hasty absorption of the Ukrainian land his army has managed to seize have been seen as desperate rather than confident displays of weakness.
His reputation took a further damage when Ukraine was able to detonate what is presently believed to have been a truck bomb on the Kerch bridge connecting Crimea to the Russian mainland.
The callous long-range missile attacks on Ukrainian cities, which had little effect on the strategic situation, were also seen as signs of his weakness.
Putin recently said that despite rumors that Moscow’s stockpile of precision weapons may be running low, Russia does not now need to launch large fresh attacks on Ukraine.
The “partial mobilisation” he launched last month, which the defence minister said was intended to recruit 300,000 troops, was likewise nearing its conclusion and would be done in two weeks, he added.
“No further action is anticipated.” Regarding his ongoing mobilization, Putin said that the defense ministry has not submitted any recommendations and that he does not anticipate any further needs in the near future.
Out of 300,000 individuals, 222,000 have already been mobilized. All mobilization efforts will be finished in around two weeks.
However, with Ukraine retaining the upper hand and predictions that they would go on to reclaim the Kherson area and penetrate farther into occupied Donbas, the military prognosis for Putin remains bleak.
Expectations are similarly low for Putin’s new conscript army, given allegations that he is unable to provide for them food, clothing, or weapons and that they are being sent to the front lines with little to no preparation.
The Defense Department also said that the Russian ruler would be discouraged to learn that the United States will provide additional military equipment and ammunition to Ukraine as part of a new $725 million support package aimed at reinforcing the country’s defense against the Russian invasion.