Russian President Dmitry Medvedev on Wednesday made his first state-of-the-nation address since he took office in May, pledging to reform the international political and economic system and deploy a short-range missile system in its Baltic Sea territory in response to US missile defense plans.
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Russian President Dmitry Medvedev delivers his first State of the Nation address to the Federal Assembly Kremlin in Moscow, capital of Russia, November 5, 2008.[Xinhua]
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Criticism of United States
Speaking to an audience of about 1,000 lawmakers and government officials, the Russian president blamed the United States for a brief war with Georgia in August and the ongoing global financial crisis.
Medvedev described Georgia's military offensive on South Ossetia as a consequence of policies of the US administration, which "is over confident and intolerant of criticism, and prefers unilateral decisions".
"The conflict in the Caucasus was used as a pretext to send NATO warships to the Black Sea and then to quickly thrust on Europe the need for deploying the US anti-missile system," he said.
He called for mechanisms to be established to block "misguided, selfish and sometimes dangerous decisions" by some members of the international community.
"We will not give up our role in the Caucasus. We will overcome the global financial crisis and emerge from it stronger," said Medvedev.
He added that the international political and economic systems require a dramatic overhaul.
"The lessons of the mistakes and crises of 2008 have proved to all responsible nations that the time has come to act, and it is necessary to radically reform the political and economic system," he said.
"We hope that our partners – the new US administration – will make a choice in favor of a full-fledged relationship with Russia," Medvedev said in the speech, which came just hours after Barack Obama won the US presidential election.
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Russian President Dmitry Medvedev (R) delivers his first State of the Nation address to the Federal Assembly Kremlin in Moscow, capital of Russia, November 5, 2008.[Xinhua]
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