Vladimir Putin, at the "Open Dialogue" forum in Moscow, laid out his new thesis - the world is in a "deep transformation", and the rules of the West are losing their "binding force".

From Putin and from every media outlet in Moscow this is no surprise. The Kremlin has been building the "multipolar world" rhetoric for years. But one element is new - the tone is explicitly triumphalist. "Countries that have kept their sovereignty in key sectors are becoming more and more important," Putin said. Translation: the Global South no longer listens to you (the West) - it listens to us.

Economy, finance, technology, demography - all of them, according to Putin, are going through "irreversible changes". It sounds like a speech for the home audience, but the audience is wider. The forum gathered representatives from over 120 countries - from African states to India, Brazil and Kazakhstan.

"A model of global development will only be sustainable and just if it rests on the principles of equality and mutual respect," Putin said. Rhetoric that, on European soil free of irony, sounds reasonable. But when it comes from the leader of a country in an active war on someone else's territory - "mutual respect" has a different flavour.

For the Balkans, Putin's vision carries a concrete geopolitical edge. Serbia is leaning into it - Aleksandar Vucic is once again building a scenario of gradual orientation towards Russian economic and energy circles. North Macedonia, inside NATO, is on the other side. But economies do not carry passports - and when Russian gas, Indian oil, and Chinese technology line up in the same supply chain, the lines blur.

The question Putin does not answer: does a "multipolar world" mean a fairer world, or just a wider choice of masters? History does not offer many examples of the first.