Sharansky: Putin Thinks He’s the Strongest Leader in the World

Former Soviet “refusenik” Natan Sharansky says Russian President Vladimir Putin took his cue for invading Ukraine from the Free World.

“What we are hearing today, we have the Russian leader who decided on being for 20 years in power, he really decided that he is the strongest leader in the world. All the other leaders, [U.S. President] Bush, [U.S. President] Obama, [Former German Chancellor Angela] Merkel coming and leaving, but he stays forever,” Sharansky told CBN News.

A prominent human rights activist, Sharansky became known as a refusenik – a Jew who was refused permission to emigrate from the Soviet Union to Israel. 

Sentenced to 14 years, he served nine, largely for spreading the truth about human rights abuses in the Soviet Union. He was dramatically released from prison on February 11, 1986, and immigrated to Israel that very day.

Later he became an Israeli government minister and afterward the head of the Jewish Agency, the quasi-government body responsible for immigration of the Jewish people to Israel.  He's currently the chairman of the Babyn Yar Holocaust Memorial Center.

According to Sharansky, Putin wants to bring back the former Soviet Union and he’s already started by bringing back territories from Georgia, Byelorussia, and Kazakhstan.  

“Of course, Ukraine is the biggest and the most important part of his new empire. And here he started the war. And in fact, this war, which he starts, it will not finish with Ukraine. It challenges, the very basic principles of the free world,” said Sharansky.

“I think if the free world will not show the same determination and the stubbornness, as he shows, the free world is in danger," he warned.