President of Russia Vladimir Putin criticized the idea of the West to place refugees from Afghanistan in Central Asia before they obtain visas to the United States and Europe. He said it at a meeting with representatives of the United Russia party.
He called to prevent militants from Afghanistan, disguised as refugees, from entering the country. According to him, Russia should not admit militants from Afghanistan under the guise of refugees.
«We do not want militants disguised as refugees from Afghanistan to appear in our country. We do not want recurrence of the events that happened in the 1990s and early 2000s in our country,» Vladimir Putin noted, adding that «Russia does not need criminal elements from Afghanistan and Syria.»
«Imagine, refugees entered any of the states ... who are these refugees? How do we know? There may be thousands or even hundreds of thousands of them, and maybe millions. We do not even have visa regime with our closest allies and neighbors. What kind of border it is? Thousand kilometers. One can take anything, even a car, even a donkey, and move across the steppe. And what are we going to do about it?» he said.
«This means that one can send them without visas to our neighbors, but they do not want to take them without visas. This is just a humiliating approach to solving this issue,» the Russian president stressed.
According to him, this topic will be raised on August 23 at the meeting of the leaders of the CSTO countries and other events.
