Peskov: five years of Putin's term were unprecedented

Five years ago Vladimir Putin was elected Russia’s president for a third time. In March 2012, 63.6% of those who went to the polls said they wished Putin to be Russia’s president again. The campaign was a no easy one. The nervousness of the parliamentary elections held just three months before that still lingered. But, as Putin himself would describe the situation later, "this struggle has brought about consolidation inside our society and this is the most important result."

Putin also said "this is a major stride along the path of developing social self-identification, which can serve as a solid guarantee of maintaining our sovereignty in the future."

In an interview to TASS, presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov described the past five years in these words: "Those were five unprecedented years in our country’s recent history. They required of Putin the maximum self-concentration, sophisticated professionalism and boldness of a politician and citizen."

"The process of revolutions triggered from outside reached Russia’s borders and in fact developed into an armed coup in the closest fraternal state - Ukraine, causing a civil war there. The historical reunification of Crimea with Russia saved the peninsula from turmoil and casualties," TASS quoted him as saying. 

But after that Russia encountered outspoken, aggressive pressure from outside, such as sanctions, hostile diplomatic actions, complex crisis-induced phenomena in the economy, provoked, among other things, by an extremely unfavorable international economic situation following the slump in energy prices," he said.

Peskov is certain that "Putin and his team coped with all this by and large. The country has gained a firmer foothold in the international scene. The economy has regained stability. But there is the full awareness of the great amount of work ahead. Not a single person in the presidential team, let alone the president himself, thinks it is time for complacency," he added.