My spiritual pain is unbearable. I keep having the same unsolved question: if my rifle claimed people's lives, then can it be that I a Christian and an Orthodox believer, was to blame for their deaths?

Life can make you do many things, even kiss a man with a runny nose.

My work is my life, and my life is my work. I invented this assault rifle to defend my country. Today, I am proud that it has become for many synonymous with liberty.

It is painful for me to see when criminal elements of all kinds fire from my weapon.

I was trying to perform as best as possible. I was a boy at the time, but worked well with the sickle.

The AK-47 is not a device of aggression ... I devised this machine-gun for the security of my country.

My aim was to create armaments to protect the borders of my motherland. It is not my fault that the Kalashnikov became very well-known in the world; that it was used in many troubled places. I think the policies of these countries are to blame, not the designers. Man is born to protect his family, his children, his wife. But I want you to know that apart from armaments, I have written three books in which I try to educate our youth to show respect for their families, for old people, for history.