Therefore, let me reiterate that the rate should not meet the interests of a specific group or one or two groups, it should meet the fundamental development interests of the economy itself.

Now they [NATO and the USA ] are sitting there, and we are talking about all these crises we would otherwise not have. You can also see this striving for an absolute triumph in the American missile defense plans.

There is no uniform, global model for democracy.

It's better not to argue with women... When people push boundaries too far, it's not because they are strong but because they are weak. But maybe weakness is not the worst quality for a woman.

Any country is hard to govern, even a very small country. It's not a question of whether the country is large or small. It's a question of how you relate to the work, to what extent you feel responsible for it. Russia is also hard to govern. Russia is at the development stage of both its political system and the creation of a market-based economy. It's a complicated process, but very interesting. Russia, actually, is not just a large country, it's a great country. I mean its traditions, and its cultural particularities.

Nobody and nothing will stop Russia on the road to strengthening democracy and ensuring human rights and freedoms.

I think that a person cannot be criminally or otherwise prosecuted, his or her rights cannot be infringed upon the grounds of nationality, ethnicity or sexual orientation in the modern world. It is absolutely unacceptable. And it is not the case in Russia.