I would like to say, you know, that, unfortunately, we have many unresolved problems. But a great number of people in Russia know Japan and love Japan, and I am sure that eventually we will resolve all our problems.

Back in 2007, many people criticized me for my talk at the Munich Security Conference. But what did I say there? I merely pointed out that the former NATO Secretary General Manfred Wörner had guaranteed that NATO would not expand eastwards after the fall of the Wall.

Look, there is parliamentary democracy in most European countries, there is parliamentary democracy in Japan, there is parliamentary democracy in many countries, but in the United States, for some reason, the State is organized differently, there is quite a stringent presidential republic.

After the demise of the Soviet Union, we had many problems of our own for which no one was responsible but ourselves: the economic downfall, the collapse of the welfare system, the separatism, and of course the terror attacks that shook our country. In this respect, we do not have to look for guilty parties abroad.

If I said that oil production would collapse I was wrong.

We have made mistakes! We were too late. If we had presented our national interests more clearly from the beginning, the world would still be in balance today.

International terrorists who pursue completely mad objectives such as establishing a world caliphate or something of the sort, are quite adept at disguising their real aims as a struggle for independence in Chechnya.