Russian President Vladimir Putin
© Sputnik/ Alexei Druzhinin
Russian President Vladimir Putin slammed the EU parliament resolution against Russian media. He said that Europe is trying to "teach" Russia democracy.

Earlier in the day, the European Parliament voted in favor of a resolution on countering Russian media outlets, such as the Sputnik news agency and the RT broadcaster. Authors of the document equate counteracting Russia with the resistance to Daesh terrorist group and call on EU member states to boost financing counter-propaganda projects.

"More recently — and these attempts are still ongoing — they [European officials] tried to 'teach us' democracy, and we have always heard from these 'teachers' that the most vicious way to do business with opponents is to ban something and that it is not consistent with the principles and norms of democracy. Open discussion is always the best way," Putin said.


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The Russian president congratulated Sputnik news agency and RT TV channel on effective work.

The EU parliament resolution is an "evident sign of degradation of the Western society's vision of democracy," Putin said. "If such a decision [of the European Parliament on the fight against Russian media] is adopted, it says that we see a quite obvious degradation in the political sense of this word of the vision of democracy in the Western society," he said. Putin also added that he hoped common sense will prevail and there would be no real restrictions concerning the work of Russian media.