Propaganda Reigns In The West

Here is what we want to achieve: first of all, we want to ensure our economy's growth in the short term, over the coming years, at the global average level, which is about 3.5 percent.

Second, it is imperative for us to achieve annual labour productivity growth of 5 percent.

And third -- this is a very important indicator -- we must bring inflation down to 4 percent. This is what we must strive for -- absolutely, through a coordinated and balanced macroeconomic and budget policy.

All the trends we are currently seeing in our economy allow us to assert that these goals are absolutely realistic and we will reach them soon. At the same time, we would naturally prefer not to respond to the destructive actions that some of our partners are attempting to impose -- and which they are imposing at a loss to themselves. There have been various calculations among our European partners; some have said that European manufacturers are losing around 40 to 50 billion; now, the most recent reports I saw and heard from Europe say that European manufacturers may suffer losses of up to 100 billion.

Our trade with Europe has dropped by nearly a quarter. Meanwhile, trade with your country, the United States, has grown by 5.6 percent. Our commodity flows from EU countries to the Russian Federation have decreased somewhat, and import has nearly halved; it used to be just under $30 billion, and now it is slightly over $15 billion.

At the same time, if we look at the trade structure, with the increase in trade with the United States, imports from the US have increased by about 11 percent. Overall, we can certainly say that this does not balance out the losses in cooperation with Europe, but I am confident, I know for certain, that nobody wants any losses at all, in the sense that Russia is experiencing a recession and many experts in Europe -- not Russian experts, European ones -- are talking about stagnation.

So if we want to create absolute growth in the global economy, in Europe, in Russia and in general, then we certainly need to eliminate various sanctions, especially unlawful ones imposed outside the framework of the United Nations, and work together. I have already stated how we are going to do that. We will broaden economic freedoms, this is a key element; we will ensure a competitive jurisdiction and work on our human resources and improving management systems.

Charlie Rose: On my right is Heinz Hermann Thiele, Knorr-Bremse chairman of the supervisory board. We were just talking about sanctions and import substitution. What do you think are the risks and opportunities? What could you say in this regard about Russia? How do you see the situation from a Western point of view?

Supervisory Board Chairman of Knorr-Bremse Heinz Hermann Thiele: I doubt I can present the European point of view here, because you know, many countries on the continent hold different views. I can only speak for myself personally and I can share my view of the situation.

I have always been against sanctions and I still believe they are wrong. I am not the only person in Germany who holds this view. I support President Putin's statement: it is time to bring the sanctions to an end.

I hope that now everyone in Europe has seen that Europe itself has suffered from the sanctions, and very significantly. If we look at the statistics from 2014-2015, the last two years, exports from Germany to Russia have dropped by 50 percent. I am not counting our subsidiaries which are working in Russia -- and we have many of them -- incidentally, they are working quite successfully in manufacturing and transport; we have excellent experience in cooperating with Russian partners.

Coming back to the situation in other European nations, look at Italy: Italy has lost only 10 percent of exports compared to the indicators for last year. So the situation is not as bad for them. In other words, the effects for different European nations also differ. Their interests vary as well. In this respect, I cannot say that we have common interests. Common decisions are made at the political level, but one way or another, regardless of the motivation, these are wrong decisions.

We must understand that Russia, in implementing its policy of turning to the East, is taking an absolutely logical step, because the East can offer Russia a great deal. We should not forget that we Europeans, we Germans -- my company, I have a medium-sized company -- we are working on the international arena, we have great relations with, for example, the Chinese. We have excellent joint business, and we very much like working with them. Why shouldn't Russia do the same?

To some degree, it is tragic that we have pushed Russia in that direction through the sanctions. We need to leave the sanctions behind. But all nations should have the opportunity to make independent decisions on where it is best to develop partnerships: in the West or the East, it does not matter. We are in favor of global development -- peaceful development, I should add. Unfortunately, at this time, we cannot say that we are satisfied with the situation in either aspect.

To be continued.

[I assume that this means further translation of interactions with foreign business interests are forthcoming on the Russian website. If you are interested, you can go to the Russian presidential site and watch for the continued information.]