MOSCOW, Sept. 6 (UPI) -- Russian President Vladimir Putin said he will not try to alter the nation's constitution to run for a third term in 2008, a report said.
Putin, in a more than two-hour meeting with Western academics and journalists, also said Russia will not tolerate outside interference in former Soviet Union nations, the Times of London reported.
"We are not against any changes in the former Soviet Union. We are afraid only that those changes will be chaotic," Putin said. "Otherwise there will be banana republics where he who shouts loudest wins."
Putin's performance was clearly intended to soften his authoritarian image in the West and thoughts he may try to run for another term in office, the newspaper reported.
"No, I am not going to run for president in 2008. No, we are not going to amend the constitution," Putin said.
His comments ranged widely from Ukrainian corruption he blamed for scuttling a gas pipeline between Russia and Europe to sympathy for U.S. devastation in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.
