An event hosted by Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev entitled “For Freedom of Nations International Forum” and “Forum of Supporters of the Struggle Against Modern Practices of Neocolonialism” took place in Moscow on Feb. 15-17, bringing some 400 delegates from 50 countries, including South Africa, Zimbabwe, China, North Korea and others, including some NATO members.
Addressing the opening of the forum, Russia’s President Vladimir Putin said, “I believe that your representative meeting is an extremely important and timely initiative. Neocolonialism is a shameful legacy of centuries-long plunder and exploitation of the people of Africa, Asia, Latin America and other regions of the planet. We can see its aggressive manifestations in the attempts by the collective West to preserve their stranglehold and domination at any cost, to economically subjugate other countries, to deprive them of sovereignty and to impose alien values and cultural traditions upon them. This practice has become one of the main destabilizing factors in international relations and an obstacle to the development of humankind as a whole….
