©Anton Novoderezhkin/TASS
The West tried to hit Russian citizens themselves with sanctions, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said on Thursday in his annual government report to the State Duma.
"In the very beginning, the West tried to assure us that the sanctions were not aimed against our citizens. At that time there were no illusions about it, but now even a person far from global politics understands: the main target was the Russian people," the head of the Russian Cabinet of Ministers pointed out.
He explained that the West was trying to bring down the Russian financial system so that people could not use bank cards, and disrupt economic and business ties, forcing their own companies to withdraw from the Russian market, taking huge losses.
"They tried to make the products Russians are used to disappear from store shelves, and at the same time throw them out on the street and deprive Russian employees of making money from working at these organizations, that is, those people, whose work created their multibillion-dollar profits. They wanted to cause mass unemployment in our country and radically reduce the quality of life," Mishustin added.
He stressed that Russia's opponents "did not hesitate to use any means." "They blew up the Nord Stream gas pipelines, froze bank accounts, cut banks off from the international payment system, and tried to block all banking and economic activities," the prime minister pointed out.
"They used to tell us about the inviolability and sanctity of private property but today, the property and money of our citizens and companies are being seized only because they come from Russia," Mishustin concluded.
Short-term budget deficit not a threat for economy — Russian PM
A minor increase of the state debt and the short-term budget deficit do not pose a threat to the national economy, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said on Thursday.
"We are also within the rather comfortable range of our debt. Our state debt is approximately at the level of 15% of GDP. There is no need to indicate figures of the state debt of unfriendly states. It is slightly above 60% even with the majority of developing economies," the Prime Minister noted. "The short-term budget deficit and the small increase of the state debt do not pose a threat to us," Mishustin said.
Russia is feeling confidence in the budget sphere, the Prime Minister added.
Russia becomes largest investor in Iran this financial year — Finance Minister
Russia has invested $2.76 bln in Iran becoming the largest investor in the country’s economy in the current financial year. Ehsan Khandouzi, Iran's finance minister, said this in an interview with the Financial Times published on Thursday.
"We define our relations with Russia as strategic and we are working together in many aspects, especially economic relations," Khandouzi told the Financial Times.
"China and Russia are our two main economic partners [and] Iran is going to expand its relations with them through implementing strategic agreements," the minister said.
According to the Iranian Ministry of Economic Affairs and Finance, this financial year, the volume of foreign direct investment in the country amounted to $4.2 billion and two-thirds of the investments came from Russia. As the politician noted, we are talking about financing projects in the mining sector, as well as in the fields of industry and transport.
In January, representatives of the central banks of Russia and Iran signed a cooperation agreement to simplify financial and banking operations. As Khandouzi noted, Tehran negotiated this issue not only with Moscow, but also with Beijing and Ankara. However, "technically speaking" the financial network is in a better situation between Iran and Russia than others, the politician noted.
Medvedev says diplomacy doesn’t always work, special op was right move
There are situations where agreements are counterproductive and one needs to take steps like launching a special military operation, Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev said in an interview with Russian media outlets, including TASS, and users of the VKontakte social media network.
"In my view, it makes no sense to negotiate in certain situations. One must ignore it, and in some cases make decisions like the one that was made on February 24 last year because agreements can be counterproductive in certain cases," Medvedev pointed out, when asked if Moscow needed to make agreements with the countries that failed to see Kiev’s crimes.
According to him, Moscow tried for decades to convey some simple things to the West. "Guys, the Soviet Union collapsed. Yes, it’s sad but that is what happened, both because of the Soviet leadership’s incompetent policy and your external interference. The country fell apart but ties did not, and the people remained the same. How do you imagine that? Ukraine becoming part of NATO?" he said, clarifying Russia’s message. Meanwhile, Ukraine "had its own nuclear weapons complex," Medvedev went on to say.
As a result, Russia would get a neighbor "who is not only a member of an unfriendly bloc but also plans to produce nuclear weapons," he noted. "I would like to point out that Ukraine’s leader spoke about this shortly before the start of the operation, in late 2021. So do you want us to put up with it? Particularly in a situation where we have a dispute over Crimea because we consider it part of our land and they regard it as their territory. So imagine them joining NATO and launching a large-scale operation against our country under NATO’s umbrella - we cannot accept this," Medvedev stressed.
The politician stressed that Russia had proposed a draft agreement on security guarantees to Western countries. "They responded ‘no’," Medvedev said. In his opinion, "the current ramifications are much more complicated than they would have been" had the document been signed last December.
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