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Russian President Vladimir Putin attacked the U.S. and Europe for backing Ukraine and likened Crimea, which his government annexed in March, to Russias Jerusalem.

Putin said he wasnt surprised by the separatist conflict after what he termed the coup and violent takeover of power in Kiev in February. The U.S. and European Union, which imposed sanctions that are hobbling Russias economy over its stance on Ukraine, would have penalized his country even if the conflict hadnt broken out, he said.

Crimea has invaluable civilizational and even sacred meaning for Russia, like the Temple Mount in Jerusalem for the followers of Islam and Judaism, Putin said in his annual address to parliament and other top officials in Moscow yesterday. And this is how we will always consider it.

The U.S. and the European Union blame Putin for stoking the conflict, which has touched off the worst standoff between Russia and its former Cold War foes since the fall of the Iron Curtain. Putins government has also vowed to increase bomber missions to as far as the Gulf of Mexico, prompting NATO countries to reassess their military readiness.

Russia has been hit by falling oil prices that have dropped by more than 35 percent since June. Russia depends on oil and gas revenue for about half of its federal budget. The ruble has lost about a third of its value since Putin started his incursion into Crimea. It fell 2.5 percent to 54.4995 per dollar at 7:53 p.m. in Moscow yesterday.

Putin brushed off the sanctions, which have limited access to capital markets for some Russian banks and companies and blacklisted officials involved in the conflict. His government denies any involvement in fighting that broke out after protests toppled former pro-Russian Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych and he fled to Russia in February.

If none of that had ever happened, they would have come up with some other excuse to try to contain Russias growing capabilities, Putin said.

Putin likened his global opponents to Adolf Hitler, who tried to push Russia back behind the Urals and warned everyone should remember how that ended.

U.S. White House spokesman Josh Earnest said Putin had presented a revisionist narrative on the crisis in Ukraine that was deeply troubling but utterly unconvincing.

U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said Russia is forcing its own citizens to pay a steep economic and human price, including the price of hundreds of Russian soldiers who fight and die in a country where they had and have no right to be.

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Putin Assails Opponents on Ukraine, Likens Crimea to Jerusalem