Moscow - Saba:
Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the United States is acting very pragmatically in its relations with other countries, as it continues to purchase nuclear fuel from Russia, for example.
According to the Russia Today website, Putin added, during his meeting with members of the "Russian Entrepreneurs" organization, explaining Washington's position on Tuesday: "We must make purely pragmatic decisions. The United States, despite everything, is acting very pragmatically. They do not forget their own interests. We are still exporting nuclear fuel to the United States. There is no problem with that. We do it with pleasure."
Putin indicated that the United States is following this approach because it is beneficial to it, adding: "This is true and deserves praise. Their economic growth rate is very high and respectable. It is not 4.3% (as in Russia), but it is still very good. While the major European economies have actually slipped into recession.
This is the result. We must act in the same way—very pragmatically at every step." At the same meeting, the Russian president emphasized that the development of the defense industry is not the only factor behind the rapid growth of the Russian economy, saying: "We have achieved a lot together. Otherwise, there would not have been 4.1% growth before last year, and 4.3% in [last] year. We know the source of this growth. And it is not only from the defense industry."
Putin denied the claim that the military-industrial complex, in the context of the needs of the special military operation, is solely responsible for the remarkable growth in Russia's GDP.
He emphasized: "Not only the defense industry. Not only the defense industry, but everything we have talked about here today winemaking, the hospitality sector, high technology, and so on. All of these together make a significant contribution to the development of the economy."
It is worth noting that in February 1993, the United States and Russia concluded an intergovernmental agreement on the processing of weapons-grade highly enriched uranium into low-enriched uranium to fuel American nuclear power plants.
| more of (International) |