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President Vladimir Putin: Good afternoon, colleagues,

First of all, I would like to thank all the members of the government who took part in the work of the committee organising Sochi’s bid for the 2014 Winter Olympics. This work is complete now and we have achieved our goal. The government made a big contribution to this outcome.

The main thing now is to carry out the plans that have already been drawn up in their general outlines. I remind you that of the 12 billion we plan to spend on this project, 5 billion are to come from private investment. [Economic Development and Trade Minister] German Oskarovich [Gref] will say more about this later. It looks hopeful that we will be able to raise even more private investment than was initially planned. This means that the remaining funds – state funds, including expenditure programmed in the three-year budget – must be spent rationally. Two thirds of this money is to go towards infrastructure development in southern Russia, in that part of the country where millions of Russian citizens spend their holidays every year. This includes building roads, bridges, tunnels, sewer systems, water and electricity supply systems – everything that people need for a decent life. The remaining funds are to be spent on building the sports facilities themselves, facilities that will also be used by our citizens, by all those who enjoy winter sports and like to spend their holidays in the mountains. Some of these facilities, naturally, will be used to provide our Olympic teams, in winter and summer sports, with the training conditions they need. All of this together gives us reason to say that we have here an excellent opportunity for developing southern Russia.

I ask you to work just as hard and just as professionally as you did on promoting Sochi’s bid for the Games.

I have signed a Decree on Preparation and Organisation of the XXII Winter Olympics in Sochi. One of the Decree’s provisions calls for the need to ensure safe conditions for everyone attending and taking part in the Olympics. I think that we should give this provision a broad interpretation. I plan to ask the Prosecutor General’s Office to set up a working group on ensuring security in the future and on monitoring work on building the needed facilities in order to ensure that money is spent rationally, as I said, and that under no circumstances are state funds embezzled.

That is what I wanted to say for a start about the Olympic Games.