FULL PRESSER: "Level to the Ground", Putin Issues Stark Warning to NATO and 1st Reaction On Romania

Good afternoon. You've been waiting quite a while and a lot of things to discuss with President Lukashenko. I'm ready to take your questions, please.

It might seem odd, but just before I entered this hall, I was told that something happened with our drone, allegedly. If you could repeat what happened one more time, I would be very grateful. I'm not joking, then I could comment on this.

No, yes, I heard the question, but what the drone... Why didn't they shut it down? Can you hear me? I don't even understand what you're talking about. Someone told me just before I entered here, a drone entered the Romanian airspace. No, I don't know. What drone? So, please tell me what's the information in the media now?

Who says that it's a Russian drone?

Many people means no one. Precisely who? Names.

Well, she didn't go to Romania. She didn't investigate. She didn't look at the remnants of the drone. No one can say where a flying vehicle came from before they run a foreign engine analysis. Because some drones, Ukrainian drones enter Finnish airspace, Polish airspace, the Baltic countries' airspace. Ukrainian drones do that. And the first reaction was exactly the same like they have now in Romania. 'Russians are hitting us,' they were saying. And then they found out that these drones had nothing to do with Russia. Russia had nothing to do with these drones. They came from Ukraine. They strayed off under the influence of jammers or for whatever other reason, maybe some technical error, deficiency. And I believe that the same is happening here, has happened here. And until we receive some objective data, like the data that we handed over to the representatives of the American administration, the data and the debris of the drone that hit the residence of the Russian president. So, we gave the findings. If we receive this data from them, and then we can share our estimates of what happened.

Well, the conditions of the funding in this case are similar with all the other transactions and deals and operations in all the other regions. It's a standard international practice. If someone is doing something, then as a rule this country earmarks some funds. In European countries and in our countries, we now have these loans that are earmarked to support domestic export. In this case, export of commodities and services. So, it is profitable for us. What I mean is we are not giving this money away. We are loaning this money and we are going to get this money back to our budget because there is an interest rate, which is normally the case. And the interest rate is quite acceptable. It's in line with all the international standards. And then we have our plants and factories receiving the orders to manufacture something and then in the future we also service and maintain the plant. We provide spare parts and fuel and so on. So, it is profitable for Russia also because we have a long-term cooperation with Kazakhstan in the field of raw uranium. It is profitable for us because Kazakhstan is one of the countries with one of the largest uranium deposits. And it is profitable for Kazakhstan as well because logistics, everything is located nearby. We are partners in the field of nuclear energy. So, it is also profitable to make progress in these regards. So, we are not just supplying fuel and also receiving the technology. It is important for all the partners of ours, including Kazakhstan. We're not just building something using the state loan. We are establishing an industry. We are training personnel. We are attracting local employees to work there. I don't remember how many of them will be in Kazakhstan, but at least 25% of all the works that are to happen during the construction works. So, that's something that our partners are in charge of. We supply fuel. We dispose of the spent fuel. And we discussed how we can think together and supply the fuel to this plant together because 20% of the energy consumption in Kazakhstan will be satisfied with this nuclear plant. So, it is profitable for both sides. We've been drafting this agreement for a long time. We've been looking for a compromise. So, a lot of work was done to make it profitable for both Russia and Kazakhstan. And there was a question about summing up this state visit. We are happy with this visit because we drew a line because we discussed what was accomplished. We have a record high trade turnover. And we have good growth trends. So, we discussed the priorities in our cooperation in all the priority areas and we discussed all the areas of our cooperation. And leading role here is with the humanitarian cooperation because maintaining good neighborly relations, basically familiar relations between our states, between our nationals is of utmost importance because it creates the long-term important level of trust between the two states. As you know, we've launched a new project in the field of education for gifted children on the basis of the Sirius program and we are grateful to the president of Kazakhstan for the attention he's paying to develop Russian language in all the schools, in all the educational institutions. There are classes in Russian and they welcome this. And the president of Kazakhstan has a vast experience in foreign affairs, including the United Nations and he understands the importance, the significance of being fluent in foreign languages. So, in our relations with Kazakhstan, for a long time we were one state and in the Soviet Union Russian language was a language of inter-ethnic communication and he believes it's important. He supports it and Russian is an official language of the UN and it is very important considering the growing trade turnover. You know, it may sound primitive, but the more economic ties we have, the more the language is in demand. So, to develop the economy, it is also very important to support Russian language and President of Kazakhstan doesn't just understand this, he's making practical steps to support it. So, I believe all the goals that we have set, we have accomplished and we are happy with the outcome of this joint effort.

Well, I expected this question because that's something that we discussed during the narrow format meeting and I told... We discussed that with Deputy Prime Minister of the Armenian government. I said that the only way to speak about that is being open about this, being honest and sincere about this. I will tell you what we discussed during that meeting. I will give you the topics of this conversation item-by-item and our Armenian counterpart, the Deputy Prime Minister said that that's right. We need to speak about this openly, honestly, but before I answer your question, I will go item-by-item. Answering the question that you asked. And that's how we did it during the narrow format meeting. It's not a secret. Everyone should know this. But before I say this, I would like to note one very important thing, Russian and Armenian people they are connected with the ties of friendship and we enjoyed special relations for centuries. Our relations are truly special, relations between Russia and Armenia, between Russian people and Armenian people. I told Prime Minister Pashinyan, he can confirm this. I told him everything that's good for Armenia, for Armenians will be acceptable for Russians. Do whatever you deem necessary if it's in the interest of the Armenian people. You are the leader, you are responsible for making these decisions, so it'll be however you say it is. It is not going to ruin the humanitarian ties between us. It is not going to ruin the political ties between us. We are speaking about merely economic things, everything that could be calculated. It needs to be calculated. It needs to be looked into. Then the decision should be made. Like I said, the crisis in Ukraine started with the attempt to bring Ukraine to the EU and we were not against this. We simply said that for example phytosanitary norms are different. It means they access to the markets in Russia or back in the Soviet Union. It means also the Eurasian Economic Union countries the phytosanitary norms are much stricter than they have in Europe. For example, we have restrictions on the GMO products or people don't want to eat this kind of produce, this kind of food. Well, they don't. And we need to take this into consideration. Because there is no research on the consequences for people when you eat this kind of food. And then there are technical regulations which are absolutely different. For example, some things possible to sell in Russia, others... For example, steelworks and so on and so forth. So a lot of things they cannot exist together. It doesn't mean that we are against something. We are for it, but it will require time and it will require money as well, funds as well. Because to ensure some standards in Europe that are more advanced than the ones that we have, we need to invest money in the production facilities to ensure that we can follow these standards. That's why to combine two things tomorrow is practically impossible. That's why we will have to... So, if we speak about the cooperation in the economy, about the integration of the economy, we will have to put it on hold. So, you were asking about what do they have to gain? So, it's something that is up for discussion, but I can explain our perspective. And I'm not only speaking about Russia, but the rest of the Eurasian Economic Union member states. So, what's the advantage of being part of this union or entering this union, joining this union? It's an access to a large protected market across the entire Eurasian Economic Union space. Russia and other states territory, trade, common technical and phytosanitary norms and regulations, simplified logistics. We do not have common borders. But, the moving the commodities and the goods and the services, they are being done in most profitable way. The low energy prices, 600 euro in Europe and 150 something. Well, you cannot compare these two numbers. I'm just going item by item. Because everyone is speaking about energy now. It is important, but this is not the only advantage you get. Investment. In accordance with the EAEU bank data, 4.9 billion dollars of investment were made into Armenia. And 86% of those came from Russia. And we are not taking into consideration here the capitals that originated from Russia. They are not coming directly from Russia, but representatives of the Russian business structures, they are investing into the Armenian economy. But, well, 86% actually the number is much bigger. And the European partners promised to invest 2.5 billion euro. Who is going to invest? When are they going to invest? And still, 2.5 is less than 4.9. Now, free trade agreements, because they will have to withdraw from this as well. What will be the outcome? Number one, full-scale custom control and custom fees. They will be brought back. They will need to take this into consideration. They will need to calculate. Secondly, the documents in the phytosanitary oversight field, they will not be mutually recognized anymore. So, we will not recognize their norms anymore. So, we will have to go back to that. Maybe we will recognize them later after some time. Maybe not. We will need to look at these commodities, at wine. Where is it going? Spain, France, Italy, Portugal, where? We will need to think about that. And reduction of natural trade, of tourism, and other things. Then, the laborers from Armenia, so, different norms will be applied to them. What does it mean? It means that they will need to buy patent to work in Russia, to get access to the insurance system in Russia. They will need to be living in Russia for 5 years. So, it will be a totally different story for them. So, everyone needs to understand this and to speak about this openly, clearly, and honestly. We will need to resume issue permits for the Armenian transport operators is yet another field. And then we will have to raise tariffs for the railway shipping because currently they are enjoying the domestic Russian domestic tariffs. We will have to raise them to the level of the CIS. Well, and of course raising the energy prices as well. There is not going to be any preferences in this regard. The preliminary estimates that the experts are speaking about, they will lose 14% of the GDP from this. Is that a lot or not a lot is a different matter to discuss. But still, all of these things need to be considered. For example, if we look at the three last years from since 2023, Russia's GDP was 4.1% growth, 4.9 and last year 1%. So, 10.3% growth over the last 3 years. EEU 0.4, 1.1, 1.5. And now look at the Eurasian Economic Union in 2023 4.3, 2024 5% growth and 2025 1.7. So, 11.4% over the last 3 years. So, one organization grew by 11.4 and another organization grew by 3%. I know that in Europe it's more difficult, so it's a different organization, a high-tech economy and their level is higher, probably, but these are the trends that I'm speaking about. So, we are growing faster. And we would like to ask our Armenian partners, our friends, and Prime Minister Pashinyan said it himself that he plans and he believes it would be the right thing to hold a referendum regarding what's the place of Armenia in Eurasian Economic Union or European Union. And we would like to ask them to do this as soon as possible.

Well, I gave the example of Moscow ambulances. It's just something that came to my head. And it's not the only example of using artificial intelligence in Moscow health care. I think you might be aware of x-ray and other kinds of diagnostic imaging. We collect all of the images from around Moscow. You give them to a narrow specialist for analysis. It cuts down time. It raises the quality of analysis. We've also made progress on the autonomous vehicles. Our e-commerce platforms such as Ozon and Wildberries. They're very successful in that. They're also establishing their own financial institutions. And we also have our successes in science and education using AI tools quite successfully. It's very important for maintaining technological sovereignty. I think Russia is one of three countries who have an actual chance at developing a sovereign artificial intelligence and we're actively doing that. We need to have your own technologies and our Chinese friends are giving the fundamentals to everyone who's willing to take the basic technologies that you can use to develop your own solutions, and that is very good. Some of our companies say it openly. Yes, we took some of those technologies. Yes, we agreed the developer and others said that they're creating their own technologies from the ground up. It requires significant investments, of course. Sber is currently doing that. And of course, if you have a sovereign platform you will be able to use these kind of technologies in defense, in public governance and in other critical fields. We're one of the few countries who are actively doing that. Of course, it would be much easier and the more effective that if we could join forces with our partners. And I'm of course talking about EAEU partners first of all. And it's something we discussed during our informal conversations. Various formats were proposed that it's attracting significant interests. We have historically had very good relations and high level of trust. We are willing to share other know-how with our friends and partners so that EAEU countries can create their own national platforms. And we are fully prepared for cooperation in this field, including in the critical areas. As I said yesterday, you need more than just investments for AI. You need a lot of energy, too. Google is now planning to build its platforms with an output of 1 gigawatt each, I think. We have our nuclear generation capabilities. We have hydropower, including in Siberia and the north, where the climate is cold. We have lots of natural cooling. So, we have a clear competitive advantage. And there are many beneficial factors that we can enjoy. And we're ready to use that. We're ready to share with our EAEU partners and our friends and partners are interested.

Well, I think the interest is maintained from everyone's side. The case of Armenia has just been explained. I told you like I told it to my colleagues during the narrow format meetings. I held nothing back. I just used the same notes that I used during the discussion with them. So, there is no secret about this. So, the interest from all of our partners is sustained. It's becoming even stronger because the countries are active and are participating in actual work. They are seeing positive results. They're seeing the positive outcomes. And they're interested in continuing this positive trend. As to how future will look, now of course we will all like to see a high-tech future. And not limited to supplying each other with food or fuel, which is of course important for food and energy security, but we would love to see high-tech and value-added products. And this is one of the reasons why the Kazakhstan chairmanship has prioritized artificial intelligence during this meeting. It's one of the key pillars of future development. I hope this will materialize. And if everything goes well, we will meet in December in St. Petersburg.

As for the part of your question about substantive content of the keynote. Well, I don't think I will tell you because otherwise you won't come to listen to it yourself. But as to our partners, to our EAEU partners, they come every year. This is something that we are also expecting. This year we expect to see large delegations. And an EAEU observer state will be the main guest of the forum.