Ok, this is a *long* press conference: over four hours and thirty minutes.  And some of the questions might not be of interest to you.  But, for those of you who are interested in getting a sense of Putin’s personality, what kind of a guy he really is, this is invaluable: the event is 100% unscripted, the people asking the questions come from a huge pool of 1300 invited journalists so you get all kinds of folks: the official ones, the really subservient types, the obligatory Russia-hating Ukrainian, the western reporter interested about Pussy Riot, but also the local papers from small town with their local problems and tragedies, a few cooks with silly question, etc.  Putin also shows his many faces here – sometimes he is serious, sometimes he jokes, and sometimes he bares his fangs, just a little, to show that he will not be pushed around.  As character-study materials go, this is great stuff so I will provide it in two variants: first, the official Kremlin video dubbed in English and, second, an original Russian version with English subtitles.  I hope that you take the time to listen to this press-conference, it is well worth it.

The Saker

PS: make sure to press the ‘cc’ button in the second video for English subtitles.