We are going to set up a branch of the St Petersburg Mariinsky Theatre here [on the Far Easter]. We are also planning to open local branches of the Hermitage Museum and the Vaganova Academy of Russian Ballet.

Russians have different far lofty ambitions; more of a spiritual kind. It's more about your relationship with God .

Our foreign ministries will simply need to sort out some purely technical matters. I see no political restraints here. The same applies to economic matters. We, on our part, are ready. However, let me repeat once again, given that Japan has joined the anti-Russian sanctions, how ready is Japan and how can it do that without breaching its commitments to its allies? We do not know the answer. Only Japan itself knows the answer.

We have never meddled in the domestic affairs of any state and we never will.

We were also going to develop relations with the current administration [of Barack Obama], but somehow they did not work out well in key areas and, I believe, not through our fault. I will not list all the problems that emerged in the past few years.

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

America's development began with a large-scale ethnic cleansing, unprecedented in human history.