Dmitry Peskov spoke at the World Youth Festival about his love for people and history

Press Secretary of the Russian President Dmitry Peskov spoke on Wednesday with delegates of the World Youth Festival (WYF) at Sirius. The seminar was held as part of the “Knowledge” marathon and, according to the Kommersant correspondent, logically and emotionally summed up all the previous meetings of the delegates with prominent Russian government officials. The conversation, in particular, turned to love, respect and “the best democracy”—Russian, of course.

The festival youth greeted the session with the participation of Dmitry Peskov with a full house. The lecturer himself, as if not noticing the twenty-meter queue and the crowded hall, was extremely modest: “The best people of our country, the smartest and most successful, came to you. And, probably, they have already told everything… What can I add to this, and in such a way that I won’t be ashamed?”

To add, however, it was found that, although partly the short speech of the presidential press secretary did indeed repeat – or, if you like, generalize – what was said earlier at the WFM by Deputy Chairman of the Security Council Dmitry Medvedev, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, official representative of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Maria Zakharova and others, as it was said, the best people in Russia.

“If we are all here, it means that we are people who are ready to listen to other people from other countries, other religions, traditions, nationalities,” Mr. Peskov rejoiced. “This means that you are looking for mutual benefits, ways of mutual enrichment of spiritual and material things. This means you are ready to respect each other and love each other.”

This, as it turns out, is Dmitry Peskov’s generally applicable communicative formula: “This is exactly how we see relationships between people. And, to put it simply, this is how we see relations between states.” Having routinely reprimanded “countries that want to impose their way of life on others,” Mr. Peskov declared that Russia would no longer tolerate interference in its life, internal affairs, and especially politics: “We will no longer tolerate criticism of our democracy and the assertion that it is not what it should be: our democracy is the best!”

Moscow will always be open to powers that adhere to similar ideals (equality and mutually beneficial relations), the Kremlin representative promised. The Russians, he predicted, intend to “continue to live in an open country”, “be friends with partners”, “develop relations in all possible areas” with the majority of states and “wait for a minority of countries to come to their senses and join the majority that wants normal communication.” “And we have enough patience for this,” Mr. Peskov warned the doubters.

In the question-and-answer section, delegates traditionally acted according to the logic of “who knows what.” For example, an innocent interest in Mongolian-Russian projects was followed by a rather explosive question from a representative of the Azerbaijani diaspora about the actions of the Russian Federation in Armenia and the actions of Armenia in relation to the Russian Federation. Dmitry Peskov, however, did not make a mistake. Showing respect to both sides, he expressed hope for a speedy settlement of their relations and (in a very “working” way) admitted that “as far as we understand, there were no decisions on all this, and no one before us made these decisions through official channels.” didn’t finish.”

Further, complete cordial agreement reigned at the meeting, even despite questions from delegates from unfriendly Germany and the United States (they turned out to be Russophiles and communists, respectively).

The Chinese delegates, who had previously declared their love for Maria Zakharova, showed the same respect for the new lecturer; the representative of the Republika Srpska found a common language with the Kremlin representative on the topic of respect for the inhabitants of the ethnic enclave, and numerous Russians – on the issues of supporting the SVO, the problem of fakes and (apparently, universally popular in the Kremlin) Russian history.

“From what I’ve read lately—books about the period of Ivan the Terrible! — the president’s press secretary said with inspiration. “But I can’t understand: is he good or bad?” I can’t! Some write: just a tyrant, complete atrocities. Reading others: one of the greatest leaders in the history of the state.” This Mr. Peskov, it seems, intends to resolve the dualism by continuing “internal research” on this matter, but history itself, the Kremlin representative is sure, requires a very scrupulous approach and filtering of “outright distortions and attempts to disfigure” in any topic: “History , as we know, largely consists of interpretations. And plus, you know: history is written by the winner.”

Grigory Leiba, federal territory “Sirius”