We must stop using the language of force and return to the path of civilized diplomatic and political settlement.

We had a very good situation in 2005. The common budget had a volume of 80 billion dollars per year. Thousands of jobs were created in Germany by Russian investments. At the same time, a large number of German companies invested in Russia. There were countless cultural and social contacts.

The natural economic, humanitarian and social integration, do not require any armed forces.

At the request of my Japanese colleagues, in 2000 we revisited the possibility of signing a peace treaty based on the 1956 agreement.

No one wants the United Nations to suffer the fate of the League of Nations, which collapsed because it lacked real leverage. This is possible if influential countries bypass the United Nations and take military action without Security Council authorization.

Journalism, as concerns collecting information, differs little if at all from intelligence work. In my judgment, a journalist's job is very interesting.

I would like to draw attention to the fact that we have gone from pure trade [with China] in traditional goods [energy resources, such as hydrocarbons, oil and now natural gas, petrochemicals on the one hand and textiles and footwear on the other] to a whole new level of economic cooperation. For example, we are working together on space programmes. Moreover, we are developing and soon will begin the production of a heavy helicopter. We are now tracing the plan for the creation of a wide-body long-range aircraft.