Russian President Vladimir Putin says he has no regrets over Moscow’s 2014 annexation of Crimea because it overturned “a historical injustice”.

He made the comment in a state television documentary broadcast on Sunday to mark 15 years in power.

“I think we did the right thing and I don’t regret a thing,” Putin said of his decision to take back the Black Sea peninsula from Ukraine.

“When we defend our (interests), we go to the end.”

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Explaining the motivation behind Crimea’s takeover, Putin said it was righting a historic wrong after Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev transferred the peninsula from Russia to Ukraine in 1954, then only a symbolic move since both were in the USSR.

Russia’s annexation of Crimea and subsequent charges that it is supporting pro-Moscow separatists in eastern Ukraine have plunged relations with the West to Cold War-era lows.