Here we have 40 million Russian citizens involved in the sphere of agriculture one way or another. This is very important.

Kiev's attempts to exert economic pressure on Donbas (region of east Ukraine) and disrupt its daily life only aggravates the situation. This is a dead-end track, fraught with a big catastrophe.

[Economic restrictions] is one of the elements that is destabilising the world economic order that was at one time created largely by the United States itself at the dawn of the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade that was later transformed into the World Trade Organisation.

In Russia all people enjoy the equal rights, including homosexuals.

There is no uniform, global model for democracy.

I believe a healthy lifestyle is an extremely important thing which underpins solution to numerous important problems, including the health of the nation.

This is the large range of issues we have to discuss [with Shinzō Abe] and make a decision on each one of them. Look, after the resumption of the negotiating process in 2000, we did not refuse to consistently work toward signing this peace treaty.