Kallas: Last week's events in Russia were a 'special nomination operation'
Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas (Reform) told reporters in Brussels on Thursday that she refuses to recognize the political event that took place in Russia last weekend as a presidential election. Kallas instead referred to what happened as a "special nomination operation."
"I refuse to call them elections. I call it a 'special nomination operation,' because they were not elections," Kallas told reporters from international media outlets on arrival at the European Council.
According to Kallas, the Russian authorities are engaged in election posturing to pretend that they too are holding elections, even though they do not believe it themselves.
"It is in fact to undermine our elections, our democracies, to say that it's all the same," the Estonian prime minister explained.
"That is why I think we should not call them elections," Kallas said, adding that as they cannot be considered elections, they cannot deliver a result which allows someone to say he is the president. "So, he is just 'Putin,'" the Estonian leader said.
Kallas' naming of the so-called presidential elections in Russia on March 16-17 could be seen as a dig at Russian leader Vladimir Putin, who refuses to call the full-scale military offensive against Ukraine launched on February 24, 2022 a war, insisting instead on the term "special military operation." The Russian authorities also punish those who refer to what is happening in Ukraine as a war.
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Editor: Mait Ots, Michael Cole
