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President Vladimir Putin: First of all, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to thank the President of Armenia and the Armenian leadership for inviting me to Yerevan.

We have finished an important stage of our work in the capital of Armenia. We have held negotiations at the highest level. We can say that by signing the Declaration of Allied Interaction between the Russian Federation and Armenia in Moscow in September 2000, we secured considerable progress in all areas of our interaction. The main purpose of the visit today is to discuss trade and economic issues. The potential of Russia and Armenia can be used to its utmost in this field.

The situation is favourable for the development of trade and economic ties. As you know, the Russian economy is beginning to pick up and the economic situation is improving. Last year, economic growth was 8 percent. We can say with confidence that there will also be considerable growth this year, more than is planned, and favourable conditions will be created for the development of trade and economic ties.

The President of the Republic of Armenia, Robert Kocharian, and I have reached concrete agreements. Prerequisites for setting up Russian-Armenian enterprises in key fields of the Armenian economy will be created in the near future under the auspices of the inter-agency commission on economic cooperation. We hope very much that new and well-paid jobs will be created. These enterprises will work for the benefit of both the Armenian and Russian economies.

We signed the Treaty on Long-Term Economic Cooperation up to the Year 2010 as the main document of the visit. We signed it in your presence, dear colleagues. It will lay a firm legal foundation for enhancing our joint business activities. During a broad-format discussion today, the President of Armenia noted that the legal basis between the two countries seemed sound enough. At the same time, the Treaty on Investment Support, which is one of the cornerstone documents, as we can say now, in the legal basis of cooperation, had not been signed until now. We filled in this gap today.

The synchronization of the positions of Russia and Armenia on the main issues of international politics revealed identical views, including on key aspects of strategic stability. Armenian-Russian political interaction is proceeding at the highest level and in the most effective way, both in the UN and the OSCE.

The negotiations showed that Moscow and Yerevan are determined to further strengthen the CIS. We have noted the need to support and develop our cooperation within the framework of the Collective Security Treaty. I would like to express gratitude to Robert Kocharian as Chairman of the Collective Security Council for his work to make the Treaty more effective.

I cannot but touch upon what happened in the US on September 11. These tragic events made us reevaluate the existing collective security system. Terrorism has become the main threat in the new century. This is why we will continue to enhance the CIS Anti-Terrorist Center as a tool to fight this evil. We also had a detailed discussion of problems in the Caucasus. We consider the Caucasian Four to be a good model for building a regional system of security and cooperation in the Caucasus.

We could not, of course, ignore the Karabakh problem. I want to stress one more time that Russia is ready to play a positive role in the policy of conflict settlement pursued by the President of Armenia and the President of Azerbaijan.

Russia considers Armenia as a reliable partner. The policy of enhancing and improving Russian-Armenian interaction is a fundamental choice of not only the leadership of Russia but of all peoples of the Russian Federation.

Thank you very much for your attention.

Question: Will it be necessary to take new measures to fight international terrorism and how do you assess the current situation in the world?

Vladimir Putin: You know, the situation in the world has changed not because of the terrorist acts. It changed a long time ago. Unfortunately, we simply didn't notice this. The tragic events in the US only confirmed these changes. Of course, terrorism has become one of the main threats to modern world, and we cannot but respond to this. But the parameters of new security systems have yet to be discussed.

I will soon meet with the US President in Shanghai and I will make a visit to the United States later this year. There will be a meeting with the EU leadership and at the NATO headquarters in Brussels this month. And we will discuss this problem in all these meetings. I would only like to avoid looking for scapegoats for what happened. I think that the accusations we hear now that someone overlooked the strike, that someone failed to do something properly are unfair. It's just that the old security system was not adjusted to avert such threats. Having drawn conclusions from what happened, we have to create this system. I am sure that everybody is interested in this, at least Russia is.

Question: Considering the situation in the world, are military operations against international terrorism involving Armenia and Russia possible?

Vladimir Putin: You know, we should not, of course, act like bandits who strike stealthily. We must weigh our decisions and adopt them on the basis of real facts, veritable facts we will have. I am absolutely convinced that evil must be punished. I have no doubt about this. As for the participation of Armenia and Russia in some anti-terrorist actions, we believe that we can solve such questions at the regional level within the framework of the recently created CIS Anti-Terrorist Center.

Question: What additional efforts can Russia take in order to settle the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict?

Vladimir Putin: This is a problem we have inherited from previous times. We did not create this problem. It concerns, first of all, the peoples of Armenia and Azerbaijan. And it is these peoples and the leaders of these countries that should find a solution to this difficult problem. Russia will support any solution that is acceptable to both countries and is ready to act as a guarantor.

Question: Much has been said about the transfer of some enterprises or part of their shares to Russia against Armenia's debt. Has an agreement been reached on this issue, and has the list of such enterprises been specified?

Vladimir Putin: You must surely know about the discussion that was under way in Russia and CIS countries in the beginning and the middle of the 1990s when we were determining ways of attracting foreign capital into our economies. Today, thank God, hysteria about ”selling the motherland“ has stopped. Everybody understands very well that attracting foreign capital means entering the economy of Europe and the entire civilized humankind. Robert Kocharian is a very progressive person. He is very knowledgeable of modern economic development. He initiated closer interaction between the Russian and the Armenian economies. What matters are not even debts but how to attract the attention of Russian business and how to attract Russian capital to the Armenian economy. This is actually what Robert Kocharian's proposals boil down to. We understand this and share his position. We think this is a correct thing to do. However, it is necessary to choose a promising area. The President of Armenia and I, when we discussed this problem, talked about concrete enterprises and concrete areas and industries. I am not prepared to tell you right now that Russia or Russian business will come here tomorrow with such and such amount of investment or such and such package, but our negotiations on this issue were concentrated as much as possible on concrete facilities and concrete topics. And I hope that we will be able to tell you about decisions before the end of the year.