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The meeting was attended by Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, Federation Council Speaker Valentina Matviyenko, State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin, Deputy Chairman of the Security Council Dmitry Medvedev, Chief of Staff of the Presidential Executive Office Anton Vaino, Security Council Secretary Nikolai Patrushev, Interior Minister Vladimir Kolokoltsev, Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu, Director of the Federal Security Service Alexander Bortnikov, Director of the Foreign Intelligence Service Sergei Naryshkin and Special Presidential Representative for Environmental Protection, Ecology and Transport Sergei Ivanov.

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President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Good afternoon, colleagues.

You know, we hosted many leaders of CIS states quite recently, at the parade in honour of the Victory over Nazi Germany. This is only natural because the peoples of the Soviet Union won a victory over Nazism in the Great Patriotic War.

In this context, I would like to say that former Soviet republics and we have a big package of important competitive advantages for reaching positive results in our development in many areas, primarily in business and economic activities. We have common transport and energy systems and no language barrier, to name a few. This big package allows us to work effectively in this space.

Let’s talk about this topic today. Let’s discuss what we can and should do in addition in order to achieve the best results in our joint work for the development of our states.

Please, let’s start.

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