Vladimir Putin

Stability of tax policy must be absolutely guaranteed for the next six years.

I would prefer to abandon the terminology of the past. ‘Superpower’ is something which we used during the cold war time. Why use it now?

Even if we do not always agree on every aspect, nobody should take this as an excuse to declare us as enemies.

For Russia, there is not and there may not be another political option but democracy. However, Russian democracy is… not at all the realization of standards imposed on us from outside.

Anyone who doesn’t regret the passing of the Soviet Union has no heart. Anyone who wants it restored has no brains.

If you are a Christian, you are in danger. If you decided to abandon your faith and become an atheist, you also are to be liquidated according to their concept. You are in danger if you decide to become a Muslim. It is not going to save you anyway because they believe traditional Islam is hostile to their goals.

Remember how the first world war broke out. It broke out as a result of the desire to redivide the world.

When you look at a corporation, just like when you look at a slave owner, you want to distinguish between the institution and the individual. So slavery, for example, or other forms of tyranny, are inherently monstrous. The individuals participating in them may be the nicest guys you can imagine.

I’m actually proud because I beat [the] Clinton dynasty. I beat [the] Bush dynasty. Now I guess, hopefully I’m in the process of beating very dishonest intelligence because, what they did was incredible.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison.

I believe I have mentioned that President Trump – well it’s his first presidential term and he’s gaining momentum, he’s building up his experience in this field and we’ve had a dialogue on this issue [North Korea]. He listens to what I’m saying, he listens to my arguments.

Ample work in mainstream political science shows that a majority of voters are not represented by their own elected representatives, who listen to different voices – the voices of the donor class, great wealth and the corporate sector.

We don’t use the term “working class” here because it’s a taboo term. You’re supposed to say “middle class,” because it helps diminish the understanding that there’s a class war going on.

As yet we do not plan to withdraw these forces. But I direct your attention to the fact that I did not call these bases by any other name – I called them bases. We are not building long-term military structures there and if we need to, we could withdraw our military personnel very quickly, without incurring any financial losses.

Changing the big picture takes time.. and the best things to do is focus on the things that we can make in our lives if we’re doing all that. That becomes the collage of real change.

KGB, collapsed. Of course it was incredibly difficult to go through this. After all, most of my life had been devoted to work in the agencies. But I had made my choice.

One can truly enjoy his or her life only while experiencing it, and it is inevitably related to a certain level of risk.

Well, if I ever ran for office, I’d do better as a Democrat than as a Republican – and that’s not because I’d be more liberal, because I’m conservative. But the working guy would elect me. He likes me. When I walk down the street, those cabbies start yelling out their windows.

There was a study that was reported in the MIT Technology Review [in Dec 2015] saying that [in the middle latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere] the current average temperature rise is equivalent to moving south about ten meters a day. That’s pretty fast.

There is freedom of speech, but I cannot guarantee freedom after speech.

The world will not accept dictatorship or domination.