(Financial Times) In the past year, Vladimir Putin has become almost as notorious for his falsehoods as for the truth of his actions in Ukraine. He delivered a perfect example in a state television documentary this month: "Our ultimate objective was not the seizure of Crimea or some sort of annexation," he said. "[Instead,] it was to give people the opportunity to express their opinion about how they want to live… Since we stayed below the maximum number of troops allowed on our base in Crimea, we actually didn't violate anything."
In addition to this denial, and the gloss of "self-determination" on the annexation of Crimea, Mr Putin's persistent disavowals of Russian military presence in eastern Ukraine have becmoe staples of the Kremlin script. […]
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