Russian President Vladimir Putin has accused the West of “trying to cancel” Russia, as he cited the backlash against Harry Potter author, JK Rowling, IgbereTV reports
According to Putin the west is trying to cancel Russian culture, including the works of great Russian composers such as Pyotr Tchaikovsky, Dmitry Shostakovich and Sergei Rachmaninov following the invasion of Ukraine.
At a televised meeting with leading cultural figures, Putin compared the cancellation of a number of Russian cultural events in recent weeks with the actions of N*zi Germany in the 1930s.
“Today they are trying to cancel a whole thousand-year culture, our people,” Putin said, citing the cancellation of events involving Russian artists in some Western countries.
“I am talking about the gradual discrimination against everything linked to Russia… a tendency unfolding in a number of Western countries,” he said.
A number of events involving Russian cultural figures who have voiced support for the war have been cancelled, including some involving Valery Gergiev, general director of the St. Petersburg Mariinsky Theatre, who spoke to Putin during Friday’s meeting at the Kremlin.
