"If you look at what's happened to the Russian economy, even before oil prices collapsed, it is not an economy that's built for the 21st century… That's bad for Russia and, over time, it's bad for the United States, because if Russia is doing badly, the concern is that they revert to old expansionist ideas that really shouldn't have any application in the 21st century," Obama said.
Obama also praised Russian diplomatic efforts in cooperating with the United States over the Iranian nuclear program, despite the deterioration of relations between the two countries over the Ukrainian crisis.
Russia, along with five other world powers, is a party to the P5+1 group, negotiating with Iran over its controversial nuclear program, which the West suspects is aimed at developing a nuclear weapon. Tehran and the P5+1 mediators have agreed to reach a long-tern comprehensive nuclear deal by July 2015.
Russia's relations with the United States and the European Union deteriorated in 2014, when the West introduced several rounds of economic sanctions against Russia, accusing it of meddling in the crisis in Ukraine. Russia has repeatedly denied involvement in the country's internal conflict, responding to the sanctions with a one-year ban on the import of a range of food products from countries that imposed them, in August 2014.
At present Russia is experiencing an economic slowdown, with the ruble losing half of its value against the dollar since the summer. Being dependent on energy exports, the Russian economy has been affected by a sharp drop in oil prices as well as by the sanctions.
