[Al Ahram] Russian President Vladimir Putin...Second and fourth President and sixth of the Russian Federation and the first to remain sober. Putin is credited with bringing political stability and re-establishing something like the rule of law, which occasionally results in somebody dropping dead from polonium poisoning. Under Putin, a new group of business magnates controlling significant swathes of Russia's economy has emerged, all of whom have close personal ties to Putin. The old bunch, without close personal ties to Putin, are in jail or in exile or dead...
said Friday he is ready to "push" his Syrian counterpart Bashir al-Assad towards introducing reforms in the war-torn country, while vowing to continue to support his ally.
"We are ready to work with Assad so that he engages in a process of political change," Putin said at the Saint Petersburg International Economic Forum.
"We are ready to push President Assad so that he engages in discussions with the 'healthy' opposition with a view towards political reforms. It is totally feasible," he said.
Russia hosted talks in April between the regime and members of the domestic, Damascus-tolerated opposition, but the absence of key exiled opposition groups meant there was no progress in resolving the four-year conflict.
Meanwhile,
...back at the barn, Bossy had come up with a new idea, one that didn't involve kerosene...
he vowed Moscow would continue to support the Damascus regime, claiming he feared Syria would follow in the steps of Libya or Iraq should Assad leave power.
"We think it is the right decision, and it is hard to expect anything different from us," Putin said.
The Russian president meanwhile called on the West to make "supplementary efforts to fight the absolute evil, which we believe is the Islamic State
...formerly ISIS or ISIL, depending on your preference. Before that al-Qaeda in Iraq, as shaped by Abu Musab Zarqawi. They're very devout, committing every atrocity they can find in the Koran and inventing a few more. They fling
Allaharound with every other sentence, but to hear the pols talk they're not
reallyMoslems....
's fundamentalism".