I trust Angela Merkel, she is a very open person. She is also subject to certain constraints and limitations. But she is honestly trying to settle the crisis, also in the south-east of Ukraine. However, what the European Union is doing with those sanctions is nothing but a theatre of the absurd.

Our trend in the privatization process and gradual withdrawal of the state from certain assets remains unchanged.

We are expanding and improving the infrastructure of our relations. You must have heard about China's plans to participate in building a high-speed railway line between Moscow and Kazan in the Volga region, in central Russia. And then we plan to extend it to Kazakhstan and on to China.

For Russia, there is not and there may not be another political option but democracy. However, Russian democracy is... not at all the realization of standards imposed on us from outside.

There is also a huge potential for developing the aviation and space industries. As you might have noticed we have launched a new Russian spaceport in one of the Far Eastern regions.

After the unlawful decision to recognize Kosovo, everyone expected Russia to respond by recognizing the independence and sovereignty of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. This is true, this is how it was. Everyone was waiting for Russia's decision. And we had the moral right to make it but we did not. We were more than restrained. I don't even want to comment on it. In truth, we "swallowed" it.

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.