Flashback: Russian President Vladimir Putin’s first message posted to Twitter congratulated President Barack Obama on his 2012 re-election.
How times have changed.
Twitter rolled out a tool Thursday in celebration of the service’s eighth anniversary that invited users to take a stroll down memory lane and look back at their very first tweet. At the same time, the U.S. was announcing more sanctions on Russian officials close to Putin in response to his annexation of Crimea from Ukraine.
This was the first message from what appears to be Putin’s English-language twitter handle:
Congratulations to US President-elect Barack Obama
— Vladimir Putin (@PutinRF_Eng) November 8, 2012
The tweet linked to the Russian President’s official statement on Obama’s re-election, which hearkens back to a time when their relationship was a little less chilly than it is today:
“Mr Putin particularly stressed the results obtained in developing Russian-US relations over these last years, and expressed his hopes for continued constructive work together on the bilateral agenda and in resolving pressing international and regional issues, noting the key importance that cooperation between countries such as Russia and the USA has for ensuring the world’s stable and secure development,” the statement read.
h/t Washington Post
This post has been updated.
