MOSCOW, April 25 (Xinhua) -- The West should jwith Russia in countering terrorism instead of accusing it of being a hotbed of crime, Russian President Vladimir Putin said Thursday.

Answering a question about his attitude toward the Boston bombers, who were of Russian origin, Putin said extremism had no nationality.

The root causes of terrorism were not in nationality of faith, but extremist sentiment, Putin said, adding joint efforts should be made to fight it.

Putin, who was holding his first question-and-answer session with the public since returning to the Kremlin last May, said Russia was also a target of international terrorism.

"This tragedy must unite us in countering the common threats," he said.

Russians put up more than two million questions for Putin for the live TV event. Two million more questions were expected to come in during the event itself, according to organizers.

It is Putin's 11th phone-in event. In previous events, held in 2001-2003 and 2005-2011, Putin answered almost 700 questions in total. In 2011, he answered 88 questions ranging from domestic affairs to foreign policy.

Putin aide Dmitry Peskov told reporters live TV cameras were deployed in six parts of the country. Putin personally selected the questions he considered the hottest ones.