Ksenia Sobchak, the daughter of Putin’s political mentor, has said she will run in Russia’s presidential election in March.
Ksenia Sobchak, the Russian TV celebrity, socialite, and daughter of President Vladimir Putin’s political mentor, brought her long-shot campaign for the presidency to Washington, saying that her political ambitions were genuine and long-term.
Speaking at the Center for Strategic and International Studies on February 6, Sobchak indicated that, among other things, she planned to meet with administration officials about U.S. economic sanctions imposed on Russia in recent years.
Sobchak repeated her criticism of the political environment in Russia, saying the current system was authoritarian, and said she had no illusions about challenging Putin.
Russia should somehow “embrace” NATO and the EU instead, Sobchak believes, and eventually become a part of these organizations. The presidential hopeful does not see “NATO as a threat for us,” despite the massive military buildup on Russia’s borders and its hostile rhetoric, produced on a regular basis by top officials of the alliance. Sobchak, however, has partially put the blame on the EU, which presumably rejected Moscow’s advances.
“I think a good way of doing things is to have an intention and to do everything to be also part of the NATO system, to embrace NATO,” Sobchak said while speaking at the National Press Club. “The same as to embrace the European Union because we are part of this European system and many of the challenges we have we share with the Americans and with Europeans.”

sources: RT.com, rferl.org