- Let's get back to this side of the table. Polina Kastritskaya from TV Centre, the floor is yours.
- Dmitry Anatolyevich, you've already touched on the topic. We're currently seeing a shift in the mechanisms of international relations, namely sanctions and trade wars. Our relations with the US need no comment. In terms of the EU countries, we have switched to bilateral tracks, and we can say that the development is currently happening only in the east, in particular with China. What's your prognosis in terms of how the global situation will unfold? And where do you see our country in it? Thank you.
Dmitry Medvedev: "You know, I'm an optimist. Everything will be okay. From a historical perspective. But in the near future, it will be hard. Look, humanity would've already disappeared if, in the end, things hadn't been okay from a historical perspective. So I believe that the trade wars will end all the restrictions will be lifted. But we have to live now. You were right in saying that our relations with the EU, not to mention the US, are not at their best.
I've recently met a number of my colleagues from the European Union, and I said, "Listen, guys, look at what you're doing. First, you impose sanctions. But you're the ones suffering from them, having lost about 100 billion euros, or even 200, according to some estimates. Of course, we lost something too. But you don't even want to meet. Who benefits from that? You said you wouldn't be friends with us or even talk to us. But that's on the level of the European Commission. But on the bilateral level, it's kind of okay."
This is a very weird story, especially considering that many decisions about the EU are made in Brussels. They are collegial decisions that apply to all EU countries. It's a short-sighted policy, but I'm sure it will eventually end in general reconciliation.
I've already talked about trade wars. But we're willing to build our relations with European countries on the bilateral track. There's nothing especially difficult about that. Though I will remind you that when this whole situation started in 2014, the volume of trade between Russia and the EU was quite significant: $417 billion. But then it dropped to somewhere around 250. Who benefits from that? I always tell them, "Look, that money can't be recovered. It means jobs, it means business revenue, and consequently, the wages paid to your employees. So who benefited from that?"
The Americans weren't affected by that at all. The volume of trade between our countries used to be $25 billion, and it still is. They lost nothing. The trade volume is not very large, considering the size of the American and Russian economies, but they lost pretty much nothing. The Europeans, however, are one half of what they used to be. Meanwhile, the volume of our trade with China has undergone significant growth.
I remember the negotiations we had in Shanghai in the early 2000s when Vladimir Putin came there on a visit. We were discussing our goal as $10 billion in trade. It seemed really huge at the time. Now, it's more than 100, and we're aiming for 200. So there you go. We're quite happy about that, even though we believe that trade relations should be multidimensional, so the more countries we trade with, the better.
So I think they need to muster the courage to admit certain mistakes in order to get to a place where we could normalize our relations. There's now a new team in the European Union, in the European Commission. It's not yet burdened with various previous decisions, at least in terms of personal responsibility for them. They have a chance to fix this if they decide to do so. As we've said many times, it wasn't us who started this war, so it's not up to us to end it. They should be the ones calling a truce. And then things could get back to normal".
