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Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday fulminated against the West's record, singling out the US use of nuclear weapons in the closing days of the Second World War, and then western nations' centuries of "colonialism", "slave trading" and the "plundering of India."

In his speech after signing treaties on the inclusion of four former Ukrainian regions into the Russian Federation - the start of the formal process of their accession - after Russian-conducted referendums, he asserted that Russia is ready for talks with Ukraine, but "will defend our land with all the powers and means at our disposal".

Hitting out at the US, he said that it is the only country in the world that has twice used nuclear weapons, destroying Japan's Hiroshima and Nagasaki cities, and setting a precedent.

"Even today, they actually occupy Germany, Japan, the Republic of Korea, and other countries, and at the same time cynically call them allies of equal standing," he said.

"The West... began its colonial policy back in the Middle Ages, and then followed the slave trade, the genocide of Indian tribes in America, the plunder of India, of Africa, the wars of England and France against China, " he said.

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"What they did was hooking entire nations on drugs, deliberately exterminate entire ethnic groups. For the sake of land and resources they hunted people like animals. This is contrary to the very nature of man, truth, freedom and justice," Putin added.