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
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has left chilly Moscow for subtropical Sochi. He will spend the next two days convincing the world business community that the economic crisis will bypass Russia, despite the slumping stock market. He met with foreign entrepreneurs on Thursday, and will address an investment forum next Friday and then meet with Russia's top financial managers.
Vladimir Putin has settled in the Riviera, a prime-ministerial residence next to a park of the same name, in Sochi. Journalists from the Government pool were first admitted to it a few days ago.
On September 18, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin received foreign businessmen who had come to the Russian Black Sea resort city of Sochi to take part in the Sochi Economic Forum. Andrei Kolesnikov, a Kommersant special correspondent, regarded this meeting as the presentation of the Government's economic mobilisation plan.
Yesterday Prime Minister Vladimir Putin chaired a meeting of the Presidium of the Council for the Preparation for the 2014 Olympics. Kommersant special correspondent Andrei Kolesnikov reported that the unresolved problems surrounding the preparation for the Olympics made the Prime Minister blow his top. Mr Putin gave an ultimatum to the members of the Presidium demanding that they resolve matters by the next morning - not before and not after.
Yesterday, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin hosted a video conference between the officers of the emergency operations centre in charge of dealing with the consequences of the armed conflict in South Ossetia. At the emergency centre of the Ministry for Emergency Situations, Mr Putin listened to the progress reports by the ministers and had a video conference with people in Tskhinvali and Vladikavkaz. The Prime Minister made a statement that, given the status of South Ossetia as an independent and sovereign state, funding will flow from the Russian state treasury straight to the republic. Eduard Kokoity, the President of South Ossetia, has promised that any utility, medical and transport services will be provided in the republic free of charge through January 1, 2009.
On September 12, Dmitry Medvedev had his first meeting with a large group of political scientists and journalists specialising in Russian affairs - participants in the international Valdai Discussion Club. It was essential for western experts to understand "who is Mr Medvedev", and hear information about the situation in the Caucasus first-hand.
An emotion-laden interview Prime Minister Vladimir Putin gave to Russian and foreign journalists attending the international Valdai Discussion Club suggests some parallels between Russia's present confrontation with the West and the beginning of the First World War in 1914. In both cases the two sides discuss the same thing, but absolutely misunderstand each other. Will the North Caucasus detonate an explosion like the Balkans in 1914? We have asked political analyst Stanislav Belkovsky, the founder of the National Strategy Institute, to answer this question while commenting on "hot" quotations from Mr Putin.
On Saturday, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin gave an interview to the newspaper Le Figaro. He described an American plot and Russian economic progress, and explained his relationship with Dmitry Medvedev.
Russia's Prime Minister Vladimir Putin promised to respond to the US humanitarian aid deliveries to Georgian sea ports by US naval ships, mentioning however that this will be done "calmly, without hysteria". The Prime Minister was irritated by the fact that naval ships "fitted with cutting edge missile systems" were just 200 kilometres away from the Russian presidential residence outside Sochi. The appropriate response was prepared and approved.
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's recent meeting with members of the Valdai International Discussion Club has demonstrated, or rather confirmed, major changes in his behaviour. I can now understand some things in his behaviour, such as his short "er" that punctuates his otherwise smooth speech, the slow tempo of his speech, although people in St Petersburg, where Putin lived and worked before coming to Moscow, are rapid speakers. He apparently disciplined himself to search for appropriate words.
