It is better to discuss things, to argue and engage in polemics than make perfidious plans of mutual destruction.

Contemporary social democracy is what I believe is the right concept.

A new world order is taking shape so fast that governments as well as private citizens find it difficult just to absorb the gallop of events.

We are not abandoning our convictions, our philosophy or traditions, nor do we urge anyone to abandon theirs.

We need a new system of values, a system of the organic unity between humankind and nature and the ethic of global responsibility.

If not me, who? And if not now, when?

Sometimes people ask me why I began perestroika. Were the causes basically domestic or foreign? The domestic reasons were undoubtedly the main ones, but the danger of nuclear war was so serious that it was a no less significant factor.