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Reuters
Reuters
Politics
By Jake Cordell

Putin uses New Year address for wartime rallying cry to Russians

A police officer stands in front of a screen broadcasting Russian President Vladimir Putin's annual New Year address to the nation, in a subway train in Moscow, Russia December 31, 2022. REUTERS/Shamil Zhumatov

Russian President Vladimir Putin devoted his annual New Year's address on Saturday to rallying the Russian people behind his troops fighting in Ukraine and pledging victory over Ukrainian "neo-Nazis" and a West supposedly intent on "destroying Russia".

In a stern and combative recorded video message, broadcast on national television, Putin cast the war - which he calls a "special military operation" - as a near-existential fight for the future of Russia.

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