VLADIMIR PUTIN
ARCHIVE OF THE OFFICIAL SITE
OF THE 2008-2012 PRIME MINISTER
OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
VLADIMIR PUTIN
ARCHIVE OF THE OFFICIAL SITE
OF THE 2008-2012 PRIME MINISTER
OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
VLADIMIR PUTIN
"Attempts to exclude Russia from making decisions of worldwide importance, especially in the field of energy, and to ignore its legitimate interests are counterproductive."
"The people often ask whether Russia could have avoided the crisis and all of its negative consequences. Of course not. That was simply impossible. It is an illusion. The problems appeared elsewhere and not through our fault. Although nobody doubts this obvious fact, the problems have affected virtually everyone, including Russia."
“We have already developed a good working relationship in this sphere. We are ready to switch from the implementation of individual projects, which we have carried out successfully, to full-scale partnership between Siemens and our company, Rosatom. We could actively work both in Russia and Germany, and in the markets of other countries.”
“The Russian economy is open. The rules we introduced on July 1, 2007, fully liberalise the financial market, and they stay valid despite financial hardships. We will treat foreign investors on a par with Russian. We protect their interests when they comply with the rules and laws of their host country.”
“We are discussing economic partnership now, and we have not given up the prospects of joining the World Trade Organisation. We will carry on talks with our American partners, and we hope they will support Russia's entrance to that international economic agency on standard and acceptable terms.”
“We would like Russian energy to be an inseparable and organic part of the world energy, to function according to common rules, to make due profits, and secure the interests of its partners.”
“I firmly believe that dialogue between producers should be encouraged consistently. The key role in this process should belong to an organisation such as the Gas Exporting Countries Forum. I want to stress that such actions are fully compliant with international law.”
“In our opinion, the Gas Exporting Countries Forum (GECF) should become a permanent organisation, with a charter and a headquarters, representing the interests of gas producers and exporters in the international market, or at least upholding their interests and encouraging civilised market relations with consumers. It must express the cohesive position of its member states on key current issues and on development prospects in the gas sector.”
“Consumer countries also have responsibilities. They should make long-term commitments to buy specific amounts of these commodities on predictable terms. In addition, "transit" countries play a special role in global energy security, as they are responsible for the stable operation of the transport infrastructure, and for controlling risk during natural gas shipments. These are purely economic issues which should remain unaffected by politics.”
“The interests of energy producers, consumers and transit countries can be balanced only if we establish transparent and long-term market relations, with principles that are clear and understandable to, and applied by, all parties. An energy security system will be viable only if it helps maintain the necessary production levels.”
“Energy resource supplies aren't evenly distributed around the world. Therefore, it is extremely important to uphold global energy security. Russia was one of the countries to raise this issue for discussion during Russia's presidency in the G8.”
“However, certain countries' vocal concerns over energy security are nothing but political manoeuvring to cover efforts to gain preferential access to others' resources, while saving their own for some or other reasons, or because they simply do not have any. Therefore, while discussing energy security, we should have a very clear idea what each of the discussion participants means by the term. We believe that energy security includes the following aspects. For oil and gas producers, it primarily means the guarantee of sovereignty over their national energy resources, as well as a responsibility to ensure stable supplies to their consumers.”
“We admitted a number of European companies - Finnish, Italian and German - to our energy sector; they acquired the biggest blocks of shares with our power companies, invested literally billions of dollars and euros. We invite such investments. We admitted them to participate in the development of hydrocarbons - both oil and gas.”
“I have to do justice to our European partners. For their part, they ventured the construction of new routes for our energy resource supplies to Europe. An excellent example is the constructing of the North Stream gas pipeline and our plans for the South Stream, as well as some other projects. Europeans have also admitted us to their energy transport system, namely the trunk pipeline. These are very good examples of integration in a crucial economic sphere: energy.”
“We are very responsible in relations with all our partners. We are taking a direct part in international anti-crisis efforts, and supporting our allies on a bilateral basis. We have decided to transfer up to one billion dollars to the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for helping the countries which are the hardest hit by the financial crisis. We are also going to credit China and India for the purchase of Russian equipment, thereby securing jobs and profits of our companies, domestic producers.”
“We will continue talks on WTO entry. However, I consider it just as important to use the advantages of integration in the post-Soviet space. Our partners support accelerating a customs union between Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan, and also a Common Economic Space. I completely agree with this approach. These projects should be carried out it the near future. I am convinced that the development of industrial cooperation and trade with our neighbours may become a tangible factor of economic stability in the entire Eurasian region.”
“We should aggressively use the tools for advancing and upholding our economic interests, in the positive sense of the word. We plan to encourage the domestic exporters of industrial produce, and transform the system of export support into a major institution of development.“
“We can consider buying the assets of high-tech foreign companies to develop mutually advantageous cooperation and transfer part of the production to Russia on valid economic terms.”
“As in previous years, we will protect our domestic market, for example, the agrarian sector, with customs tariffs. Needless to say, we will do this without harming the interests of Russian consumers or violating our international commitments. In addition, we have decided to give price preference to domestic suppliers when they are awarded government or municipal contracts. In my opinion, such protectionism is appropriate as a temporary measure.”
As we know, Nord Stream company spent a record-setting amount of over $100 million on environmental research. As we have agreed between us, all interested Finnish agencies will receive exhaustive information on the issue quite soon. The decision will be up to relevant Finnish organisations-government agencies and, I expect, public organisations-because we intend to keep in close contact with environmental organisations on a wide range of relevant issues.
