Russian soprano Anna Netrebko has distanced herself from President Vladimir Putin and condemned Russia's invasion of Ukraine, stressing that she regrets that her past actions or statements "could have been misinterpreted."
The opera star, who resides in Austria, said on Facebook on March 30 that she wanted to set the record straight and did not support Putin.
"I expressly condemn the war against Ukraine and my thoughts are with the victims of this war and their families," she wrote.
Netrebko, 50, also said she was "not a member of any political party nor am I allied with any leader of Russia."
She said she has met Putin "only a handful of times" and these meetings were "most notably on the occasion of receiving awards" and at the Olympics opening ceremony.
"I have otherwise never received any financial support from the Russian government, and live and am a tax resident in Austria," Netrebko wrote, adding that she will resume performing in late May.
Netrebko announced earlier that she had decided to retire from concert life as her performances with the Bavarian State Opera in Munich, Germany, and Metropolitan Opera in New York were canceled after she refused to publicly distance herself from Putin in the wake of Russia's unprovoked full-scale attack against Ukraine that started on February 24.
The Metropolitan Opera in New York said it was not ready to revisit Netrebko's status.
"Having read Anna's statement, we're not prepared to change our position," said a statement from Met General Manager Peter Gelb. "If Anna demonstrates that she has truly and completely disassociated herself from Putin over the long term, I would be willing to have a conversation."
In the immediate wake of the Russian invasion, Netrebko said she opposed the war but stopped short of directly criticizing Putin -- something her latest statement also avoided.
In December 2014, Netrebko was in the center of a scandal over her decision to give a significant amount of money to Kremlin-backed separatists in Ukraine's Donetsk region.
Netrebko's March 30 announcement comes amid sanctions imposed by the West on organizations and individuals supporting Putin and his associates over the ongoing war in Ukraine.
Russian conductor and Kremlin loyalist Valery Gergiyev -- the man who discovered Netrebko -- is another famous classical musician who paid a price for not taking a stand against Putin.
Gergiyev was fired on March 1 from his position as chief conductor of the Munich Philharmonic. The 68-year-old's dismissal came after he did not respond to demands by the orchestra that he distance himself from Russia's invasion of Ukraine.
But other Russian stars have been vocal in their opposition to the war and have left the country.
Olga Smirnova, a principal dancer for the famed Bolshoi Theater in Moscow, left Russia for the Netherlands in protest of her country's unprovoked offensive against Ukraine.
Chulpan Khamatova, a prominent Russian actress known for roles in international films, has gone into exile in Latvia.