Russia needs a strong state power and must have it. But I am not calling for totalitarianism.

Political populism always poses a great danger because it disorients people, creates excessive expectations or, on the contrary, prioritises objectives that are clearly not priorities or are simply impossible to achieve.

I believe that the G20 should not interfere [foreign policy], because there are other platforms for that.

The natural economic, humanitarian and social integration, do not require any armed forces.

In the near future, despite the development of alternative energy, when you look at the economics and environmental standards, then there's no other source of primary energy in the world than natural gas. Well, perhaps there is nuclear energy but there are also a lot of issues there and there are opponents of nuclear energy. Gas doesn't have those opponents. But there is a country that is, obviously, the world leader in gas reserves. That's our country, the Russian Federation.

When you start to meet with ordinary people you understand that a Russian person, really any person from Russia, a Tatar, a Mordvin, a Chechen, a Dagestani, they are very open people, even a little naive. But there's one defining trait that probably all peoples have, although it comes out especially strongly in us. That's a drive toward fairness. It's one of the dominating, I think, traits in the mentality of a person from Russia, a Russian person.

Thank God, I think no one is thinking of unleashing a large-scale conflict with Russia. I want to remind you that Russia is one of the leading nuclear powers.