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
Germany voiced its support yesterday for the construction of the Nord Stream gas pipeline. The statement followed Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's comments expressing doubts about whether Europe needed the pipeline, RIA Novosti reported, citing Reuters.
A CIS summit of heads of government is starting in Chisinau today. The meeting is planned to adopt a CIS economic strategy through 2020. Moldova will be assuming CIS chairmanship from 1 January 2009, and this will give even greater significance to the event, said Sergey Lebedev, Head of CIS Executive Committee, at a meeting with the President of Moldova Vladimir Voronin.
US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin have proposed similar economic bailout plans. Just like Russian President Dmitry Medvedev's recent State of the Nation address and a speech by US President-elect Barack Obama, both documents have many common aspects but differ in details.
Experts say that the Russian President's state-of-the-nation address met with smaller interest than before, and blame this on the financial crisis.
A regular Russia-European Union summit will be held in the French resort town of Nice on November 14. The main topics to be discussed are a new long-term Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (the previous agreement expired on December 1, 2007), anti-crisis measures within the Group of 20, and European security. The agenda has long been agreed on and will not be changed. However, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin (who will not go to Nice - the Russian delegation will be led by President Dmitry Medvedev) caused a sensation yesterday by suggesting another vital topic for the summit. He said, "The Europeans must decide whether they need gas in the amounts that they are getting. If not, we will not build the pipeline (Nord Stream - Gazeta), we will build liquefied gas plants and ship gas to the world markets by tanker." And he added, "Only, it will cost you more. You can easily calculate it on the computer".
In November, Vladimir Putin fulfilled the promise he made during his visit to the Ulyanovsk-based Aviastar-SP aircraft factory in September, signing a decree to introduce zero import duties on aircraft with a capacity of over 300 seats.
The statement about a more flexible currency rate and the trend of a minor weakening of the rouble made by the Central Bank Chairman Monday became an instant hit. In fact, it required a lot of courage, as politicians are there to reassure the public and prevent panic, without, however, getting too far away from reality.
United Russia will measure pre-strike sentiments at major industrial facilities. The party leadership circulated this edict yesterday among the regional branches. The local branches have been told to monitor discontent among workers and report the data to Moscow, without taking independent actions to squash tensions. The information from the enterprises will be conveyed to the party's leader, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.
The heads of CIS Governments will meet in Chisinau at the end of this week. Concurrently, Vladimir Putin will pay a working visit to the Moldovan capital. This will be the first visit to Moldova by a top Russian leader in the last five years. That is, if one does not count the cancelled flight to Chisinau in 2003, when Putin learned shortly before boarding the plane that the Moldovan President would not, after all, sign the plan for settlement of the Transdnestr conflict that had been prepared at the Kremlin and agreed with the Moldovan leadership.
The Bank of Russia will continue efforts to curb the outflow of capital, as President Dmitry Medvedev supported Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's efforts by saying that cash liquidity supplied to the market was not to be immediately converted into foreign currency. Analysts say that the record outflow witnessed in October, $50 billion, will not be repeated, at least not this year. Unable to channel their assets abroad, banks are now sending the money back to the regulator. Their deposits with the Bank of Russia have grown by 200 billion roubles since November 1.
