Vladimir Putin

The then prime minister believed Russia's president was at heart a "patriot", archive files reveal.

"We don't really want to be associated with Clinton," he wrote to the prime minister. Mr Putin spoke warmly of the "closeness" between the UK and Russia. When it came to Nato, Mr Putin had told Mr Blair that he would not try to slow down the process of the bloc's enlargement. It will not however be as cosy as with the Clinton administration. They had also repeated unfounded rumours that a collision with a British submarine caused the disaster. Mr Putin had said he was grateful for the offers of British help.

Files show PM favoured allowing Putin 'a position on the top table' and encouraging him to integrate with west. Vladimir Putin and Tony Blair in Moscow in ...

Putin said he hoped to build a gas pipeline across Belarus that would supply the UK and “ensure stable supplies for decades to come”. “Despite the warmth of Putin’s rhetoric about the close links between Russia and the UK, the Russian intelligence effort against British targets remains at a high level. [Blair had courted controversy](https://www.theguardian.com/world/2000/mar/11/russia.ethicalforeignpolicy) with a hastily arranged and private visit designed to personalise ties with Putin. Key issues included Russia’s “concerning” supply to Iran’s weapons of mass destruction programme. Other papers released by the archives contain Blair’s private assessment of Putin. To describe him as a “Russian De Gaulle” would be misleading but he had a similar mindset, Blair added, and it was right to put pressure on him on a number of issues.

Sir Tony Blair believed Vladimir Putin was at heart a 'Russian patriot'. But UK officials feared Putin represented a return to Cold War attitudes and ...

He said in his November 1997 letter that while a place was set for Mr Smith, there was no chair. 'He [Sir Tony] understood that Putin had a low approval rating in the US. 'The Prime Minister described him as a Russian patriot, acutely aware that Russia had lost its respect in the world. Losing their seat is a worry for any politician. They included backing for the West's tough line on dealing with Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein and undertakings that Moscow would stop supplying Iran's nuclear programme. The then-Labour prime minister believed the former KGB man was at heart a 'Russian patriot' and it was important to encourage him to adopt Western values

Previously unseen British Government papers detail how Mr Blair described the former KGB man – who became Russian president in May 2000 – as a “Russian patriot” ...

A No10 private office official noted: “The prime minister asked early on if he could call the president-elect by his first name: Bush warmly assented (but stuck to addressing the prime minister as ‘sir’).” The documents suggest Mr Blair and his aides wasted no time in cementing the relationship with the incoming administration thereafter. A memo noted Russia needed to be informed that if it wanted to become a long-term energy supplier to Europe “capricious cuts in supply to their current customers are deeply unhelpful”. Mr Powell wrote: “You do not want to look like you are walking away from your former friend.” During a landmark joint summit between Nato and Russia in May 2002, held in Rome, host Silvio Berlusconi wrongfooted his fellow leaders when he suggested they delegate the Russia president to speak on their behalf during attempts that summer to defuse nuclear tensions at the time between India and Pakistan. Such was the intensity of the diplomacy that when the Labour leader found himself at the Kremlin for Putin’s birthday in October 2001 aides ensured he arrived with a pair of newly minted “No10 cufflinks”. A record of the meeting stated: “The Prime Minister described [Putin] as a Russian patriot, acutely aware that Russia had lost its respect in the world… The document claims “some successes” in London’s attempts to influence Putin’s thinking, but underlines the need for a “hard-headed approach to old-thinking and Soviet-style behaviour”. [Winston Churchill]to go on display in the new president’s Oval Office. But they also underline how Moscow was also keen in advancing its own agenda, namely with regard to energy security. During a meeting between Blair and Bush’s vice-president Dick Cheney, the then prime minister went out of his way to suggest the West needed to promote the “St Petersburg” – that is, European – aspects of Putin’s thinking. Some 22 years later, Putin would of course use spurious concerns about the same issue as part of the cover for his ruinous

Former prime minister believed Russian president was 'patriot' at heart.

“He [Mr Blair] understood that Putin had a low approval rating in the US. “The prime minister described him as a Russian patriot, acutely aware that Russia had lost its respect in the world. When Mr Blair travelled to Moscow in October 2001, a No 10 official informed him: “You will recall that Putin actually asked you to come to celebrate his birthday on Sunday so we are bringing a set of the new silver No 10 cufflinks as your gift – he will be the first leader to have them.”

Newly released files show the UK premier's efforts to woo the Russian president despite deep misgivings of officials.

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