Ahead of the 2018 World Cup in Russia, soccer's governing body FIFA issued its ranking of international teams and Russia came in a shockingly low 70th place. It is the lowest-ranked team that qualified for this year's tournament. The opening game of World Cup 2018 will be Russia (70) versus Saudi Arabia (67) in Moscow on June 14.
Putin calls the war in eastern Ukraine a "great tragedy." More than 10,300 people have been killed in the war between Russia-backed separatists and Kyiv's forces in the war since April 2014. Kyiv and the West accuse Russia of supporting the separatists with arms and personnel. Russia denies providing backing them despite significant evidence of such support.
Amusing cartoon by Russian political cartoonist Sergei Yolkin showing Putin walking his "direct line."
In response to the woman who says she fled eastern Ukraine, Putin says the government will try to solve the citizenship problem.
Putin now discussing the silver lining of the war in Syria, saying the action was a great experience for the Russian military, better than any training. As an afterthought, he said it was a "necessary and noble" intervention that has "stabilized" Syria.
Describes the Syrian operation as "invaluable experience."
Kremlin live-tweet: "It's important to simplify the procedure of obtaining citizenship for refugees from the DNR and the LNR." [A reference to areas of Ukraine's eastern Donetsk and Luhansk regions controlled by Russia-backed separatists]
Next question is about the ultramodern weapons that Putin mentioned in his state-of-the-nation address earlier this year. Putin repeats a lot of what he said about how great the weapons are and about how Russia was forced to develop them by the U.S. withdrawal from the ABM treaty.