The Soviet Union, and Russia as the successor state to the Soviet Union, is a founding member state of the United Nations and a permanent member of its Security Council.
South Korea's investment in Russia has not been smooth, ... Korea had planned to carry out 126 investment projects worth 273 million, but in reality, only 91 projects worth 137 million are under way.
[Egon] Bahr even said: If Russia agreed to the NATO expansion, he would never come to Moscow again.
Some countries have a parliamentary republic, some are presidential republics and some are still monarchies, but no one sees them as not being democratic. In some countries regional leaders are appointed from the centre and in others they are elected. In Russia, the president is elected through direct secret ballot, and in the United States, the president is elected through a system of electoral colleges.
We believe we have no territorial problems at all. It is only Japan that believes it has territorial problems with Russia. We are ready to talk about this.
I believe there are a lot of questions today that require expert analysis by various agencies: political agencies, foreign ministries, economic agencies and security agencies. We need to assess everything and understand what we can agree on and what the implications will be both for Japan and for Russia so that both the Russian people and the Japanese people come to the conclusion that these compromise solutions are acceptable and are in our countries' interests.
No doubt, the United States and the American people are a gear country and a great people. Nobody disputes this, but talking about exceptionalism is way too much, and this is creating certain problems in relations, and not only with Russia, as I see it.
Concerning our possibilities on the international financial markets, the sanctions are severely harming Russia. But the biggest harm is currently caused by the decline of the prices for energy. We suffer dangerous revenue losses in our export of oil and gas, which we can partly compensate for elsewhere. But the whole thing also has a positive side: if you earn so many petrodollars - as we once did - that you can buy anything abroad, this slows down developments in your own country.
I would like to inform you with great satisfaction of a new step forward on establishing partnership between Russia and Japan
Let us resolve the internal political problems of Russia ourselves
I often heard the same question: What place does Russia reserve for itself in the world; how does it see itself; what is its place? We are a peace-loving state and we want to cooperate with all of our neighbors and with all of our partners.
Russia and China also cooperate in mechanical engineering, high-speed railway transportation, lumber processing, nuclear energy production and so on. We have built the Tianwan Nuclear Power Plant. Two units are already operational and are showing good results.
After the unlawful decision to recognize Kosovo, everyone expected Russia to respond by recognizing the independence and sovereignty of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. This is true, this is how it was. Everyone was waiting for Russia's decision. And we had the moral right to make it but we did not. We were more than restrained. I don't even want to comment on it. In truth, we "swallowed" it.
Unfortunately, the relations between the United Kingdom and Russia have not developed in the best possible way; however, it has never been our fault. It was not we who decided to discontinue relations with the United Kingdom; it was the UK who preferred to "freeze" our bilateral contacts in various fields.
Russia is probably one of the first countries to have been confronted with this problem of terrorism. It took some time before the international community realised the danger terrorism poses.
In the referendum - which was still decided to take place by the Crimea's old parliament - the majority of citizens voted for belonging to Russia. This is democracy, the people's will.
Russia should be competitive, be able to protect its own interests and influence the processes that are important to it.
Russia is the biggest country in the world. It would be very difficult to surround it, and the world is changing so fast that it would basically be impossible, even in theory.
Sanctions against such country as Russia are unlikely to be effective.
We can tell the general public that the gold and foreign currency reserves of the Central Bank are not designed to finance the economy, but rather to ensure foreign trade turnover. Therefore, we need this level to be able to provide the necessary foreign trade turnover for such an economy as Russia's for a period of at least three months.
We are expanding and improving the infrastructure of our relations. You must have heard about China's plans to participate in building a high-speed railway line between Moscow and Kazan in the Volga region, in central Russia. And then we plan to extend it to Kazakhstan and on to China.
Without Russia's contribution, prices would rise even more. Some members of the EU meet 90% of their demands for gas with the help of Russian hydrocarbons and have no complaints so far. Everybody is happy. Russia is a reliable partner and has never failed her partners in Europe, even in the hardest times of its economic development.
Russia will always remember the contribution [of King Fahd] in the development of Russian-Saudi relations, which in recent years were raised to a qualitatively higher level.
I believe it is no secret that I like Japan very much - Japanese culture, sport, including judo, but it will not offend anyone if I say that I like Russia even more.
Napoleon once said that justice is the incarnation of God on Earth. I'm telling you: the reunification of Crimea and Russia is just.
