Berlusconi is being tried because he lives with women. If he was homosexual, no one would have lifted a finger against him.

Therefore today we have an absolutely sufficient level of gold and foreign currency reserves in order to ensure economic stability and sustainable foreign trade turnover.

Russia itself is a European country, and not just because our major political and economic centres are in Europe, but because Russian culture is primarily European culture.

Opposition can be useful. Every opposition movement is good and useful if it acts within the law... If there are people who act outside the law, then the state must use legal means to impose law in the interests of the majority. That's the way it's done in the U.S. and that's the way it's done in Russia.

In other words, we do not have to be obsessed with privatizing immediately and at any cost. No, we will not do it at any cost. We will do it in a way that ensures maximum benefit for the Russian state and the Russian economy.

Everything will probably never be Ok. But we have to try for it.

There is no such thing as a former KGB man.