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
Tens of thousands of Bashkortostan residents address deputies annually. This year, the amount of written requests to the republic's parliament increased twofold.
In late December 2007, Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev officially inaugurated the Year of the Family in Russia.
The Japanese Government officially called on Russia not to raise car-import duties. Tokyo believes that the protectionist measures of Vladimir Putin's Government do not match the principles of the WTO which Moscow wants to join. Analysts say the threat to deny Russia access to the WTO will not work. The Japanese automotive industry depends on exports to Russia's Far East just like Russia relies heavily on Japanese imports.
When Novaya Gazeta asked me what television personalities I would have liked to invite to my New Year's party, I was at a loss. It had been such a lackluster year that it left me no choice. The main strategists, creative directors, authors and actors ended up being just two people: Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev. Not that I was crying tears into my pillow on long winter nights dreaming of celebrating the New Year with that particular couple - it was just that these two, the Prime Minister and the President, dominated the television screens during the outgoing year.
We talked with famous TV anchor Sergei Dorenko about Russia's joys and sorrows of the past year.
Yesterday Prime Minister Putin received the Varfolomeyevs from Buryatia in his residence at Novo-Ogaryovo. Mr Putin invited the family to Moscow after 9-year-old Dasha called the Prime Minister during the Q&A session on December 4 and asked for a Cinderella dress.
The next US president, Barack Obama, could not resist the latest political trend popular with male presidents - posing for the camera with bared torsos. Naked from the waist up, Obama was photographed in the Hawaii Islands, where he spent his holiday with his wife and children.
The Finance Ministry will unofficially sequester 2009 budget spending by 6% to 7% without any public announcement or discussion. As instructed by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin on December 12, the Ministry informed the other ministries and government departments that their spending limits for 2009 were cut back to 85% of the initially budgeted amounts - with the exception of norm-related items, which make up half of the budget. This approach will enable the Finance Ministry to have 500 billion to 600 billion roubles at the beginning of 2009 (1.5% of GDP) in hidden spending reserves.
On December 23, officers of the Khabarovsk Territorial Traffic Safety Inspectorate removed a white VAZ-2101 Lada car from a private-company garage in Khabarovsk. Those involved in a December 21 protest against the Government's decision to raise foreign car import duties wanted to present the car to Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.
