After the unlawful decision to recognize Kosovo, everyone expected Russia to respond by recognizing the independence and sovereignty of South Ossetia and Abkhazia. This is true, this is how it was. Everyone was waiting for Russia's decision. And we had the moral right to make it but we did not. We were more than restrained. I don't even want to comment on it. In truth, we "swallowed" it.

Russia has made its choice in favor of democracy. Fourteen years ago, independently, without any pressure from outside, it made that decision in the interests of itself and interests of its people - of its citizens. This is our final choice, and we have no way back. There can be no return to what we used to have before.

Any attention to them (terrorists) on the part of the media, any double-standard interpretation of their motives and results of their activity means nothing but a political and administrative support of terrorist acts

I guess I can call myself a pragmatist with a conservative perspective. It would be hard for me to explain this, but I always take realities of today, lessons from the distant and recent past into consideration.

There is no such thing as a former KGB man.

I consider it to be the meaning of my whole life and my obligation to serve my fatherland and our people.

International terrorists have proved quite skilled at misleading many people about what is actually happening here in the Caucasus, and they continue to mislead people today.