Prime Minister Vladimir Putin meets with his Italian counterpart Silvio Berlusconi in Sochi
Transcript of the start of the meeting:
Vladimir Putin: Dear Prime Minister, Silvio, we are very happy to welcome you in Sochi!
It is a great pity that you had to cancel your previously planned visit but we understand why. Italy faced a big tragedy when it was hit by an earthquake, which took a heavy toll. Many people perished or were wounded, and many became homeless. We realize that this is a big tragedy and that you have to attend to domestic, political and other problems.
Allow me to use this opportunity to express once again my condolences in connection with the losses sustained by Italy. Please, convey my most sincere and deep condolences to the families of victims. I am confident that you and your government will do your utmost to help them.
However, life goes on, and we have accumulated a backlog of bilateral problems. Last year, we reached a record scale of trade. Today, we are living through a global financial and economic crisis, and we must certainly make an extra effort to keep our relations at their current high level. We also have large scale joint projects, including some in the sphere of energy.
Today, representatives of different companies have come to Sochi to take additional steps on one of our major joint projects. I'm referring to the South Stream, the construction of a new gas pipeline on the Black Sea's seabed to Bulgaria and other European consumers.
I am also glad that we have an opportunity to discuss bilateral trade and economic ties, as well as the major projects I have just mentioned. Welcome!
Silvio Berlusconi (as translated): Many thanks! I am always pleased to come here and meet my Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin.
I'm grateful for your compassion during the Abruzzo earthquake, which compelled me to postpone our meeting until today.
Thank you for the assistance you have delivered and offered. We have managed to take initial measures on our own in dealing with this emergency. Nevertheless, things continue to be tough because of aftershocks in this region.
At this point, 63,000 people remain homeless. They cannot even return to the few surviving buildings because of continued tremors, and they are afraid. Half of them are staying in hotels, and we have put the other half in tent towns.
We have now started building houses for these people. This construction should be completed in half a year. We would like to hope that there will be no more aftershocks and that people will be able to return home because 60% of the housing stock survived the disaster. We also hope that people will not live in barracks and tent towns for a long time, and that in November they will have a real roof over their heads. We have already appropriated money to restore the province and a number of cities near the the mountains, which were close to the epicenter of the earthquake.
Vladimir Putin: How much money will you need all in all?
Silvio Berlusconi: For the time being, we have allotted 8.7 billion Euros but we will need at least 10 billion Euros. Later on we will determine how much more we will need because at the initial stage it is impossible to say how much will be required. As for the monuments of culture and sights, I can only speak about churches for the time being. More than 500 churches were affected by the earthquake to varying degrees. Only 150 churches have been left unscathed, which means that 350 will have to be restored. At any rate, as a government, we have committed ourselves to restoring the earthquake-damaged buildings fully, by 100%. The government was working side by side with its citizens, and will continue doing so until life comes back to normal.
Vladimir Putin: You will have to build earthquake-proof buildings because this is a seismic zone. Will their construction cost more than usual?
Silvio Berlusconi: Obviously, there exist technologies of absolutely safe construction. We have chosen a method based on reinforced concrete blocs, which are put into the ground. They can withstand tremors because they are very stable.
Vladimir Putin: I'm asking about this in such detail because in some regions we have the same problem... We have now adopted a programme for actually rebuilding whole cities and villages with due account of the seismic danger, starting from the Far East.
Silvio Berlusconi: Yes, now we are also using advanced anti-seismic building technology. They were not applied in the construction of 95% of the buildings that sustained damage or collapsed altogether. Those with reinforced concrete did much better.
Our judicial authorities have started investigating a number of rare cases where these buildings collapsed, but in any event we already have access to absolutely failsafe technologies.
I must say that this is a big challenge but we are now distributing projects to various domestic construction companies. Yesterday, I met with two thousands of their representatives, and we have decided to act together. In a sense, we are trying to beat the evil with kindness by using advanced technology to help people.
