Blacklisted Putin ally says stands strong by Ukraine policy

Russian billionaire Gennady Timchenko, who has been hit with US sanctions, said Monday he and other businessmen will not be cowed by pressure from Washington into asking Vladimir Putin to change his stance over Ukraine. In a rare wide-ranging interview to state-owned news agency ITAR-TASS, Timchenko said being put on the blacklist has been inconvenient but that he fully supports Russia's ‘sovereign’ policy. Asked whether he and other businessmen would eventually go to the Kremlin and ask President Putin to soften his stance on Ukraine, Timchenko said this was ‘out of the question’. ‘Vladimir Vladimirovich (Putin) is guided by Russian interests in any situation,’ he said. ‘There can be no compromise here. It would not even cross our minds to discuss the issue.’ Reports recently indicated that Russia's business community is horrified by US and EU sanctions and the threat of further measures, which has hastened capital outflow and threatened to send the economy into a downward spiral. ‘I am not suffering, though there is a certain discomfort,’ said Timchenko, who is a Finnish citizen but said he moved back to Russia and rarely travels now because of ‘serious threat of provocations by US security services’, according to AFP.