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.

Nuclear weapons and other weapons are the means to protect our sovereignty and legitimate interests, not the means to behave aggressively or to fulfil some non-existent imperial ambitions.

I believe that in fact it would be economically reasonable and logical to reach a compromise [on oil production], I am sure that everybody understands this.

When people communicate freely, when labour force, goods, services and funds move freely as well, when there are no state dividing lines and when we have common legal regulation, for example, in the social sphere - all that is good enough, people should feel free.

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.

The point is that in any country, including the United States, may be in the United States even more often than in any other country, foreign policy is used for internal political struggle.

In the soul of a Russian person there is always a drive toward some kind of lofty moral ideal, lofty moral values. That definitely sets us apart, and I'm certain it's in a good way.