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Vladimir Putin held a meeting with members of the Government to discuss implementing the Culture Ministry’s work programme, the situation with municipal procurement, and work on a law to stimulate companies to introduce new technology that meets the latest environmental safety standards.
The meeting continues a series of consultations the President has been holding with senior Government officials and key ministries on implementing the objectives set out in the 2013 Presidential Address to Federal Assembly and the May 2012 presidential executive orders.
Chairwoman of the Accounts Chamber Tatyana Golikova reported on monitoring of public procurement. In particular, she said that the Accounts Chamber revealed around 500 violations in this area. The Russian regions, which also carry out monitoring work in this area, revealed 2,000 violations and filed around 460 reports with law enforcement agencies. The President noted that the results of this work should be summarised and sent to the Government.
Natural Resources and Environment Minister Sergei Donskoy reported on comprehensive solutions to the main environmental problems through spreading the use of modern technology, monitoring the biggest environmental polluters, and compulsory installation of data collection equipment at all pollution sources. Other measures examined include reviving the institution of government environmental-impact assessment, and economic incentives to encourage companies to modernise production facilities.
Culture Minister Vladimir Medinsky spoke about the work on drafting the Basic Principles of State Culture Policy, the state report on the situation in the culture sector in Russia, which will be an annual report, and work on the draft law on culture in the Russian Federation. Mr Medinsky also spoke about specific projects involving museums and libraries, reconstruction of theatres and circuses, tours by cultural groups, establishment of new cultural centres in the regions, and preparations for the national congress of folk culture representatives and ensembles.
Mr Putin also briefed the participants on the Supreme Eurasian Economic Council’s summit meeting, which took place the previous day in Minsk.
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Excerpt from transcript of meeting with Government members
President of Russia Vladimir Putin: I want to inform the members of the Government about yesterday’s meeting in Minsk.
We met to discuss the agreement on establishing the Eurasian Union, which we expect to sign very soon. Some of our Government colleagues were in the delegation and know about the discussions that took place.
Overall, the work was very productive. It was not without debates, but we did succeed in removing practically all the stumbling blocks still on the road to signing the agreement. These were all issues of importance for each of the countries taking part, but we managed to find compromise solutions nevertheless, and there are now only some technical points that still need to be agreed. I hope that all of this work will be completed very soon. As you know, we plan to sign the agreement at the end of May this year.
I want to thank all the members of the Government and everyone who took part in this work. I say again that I hope it will be completed very soon. Unfortunately, we were unable to remove all of the reference rules, but this was not in our plans in any case and would have been impossible to achieve in such a short time. The main issues were all settled and agreed, in the energy sector and in infrastructure. There are, true, still a few matters that we will take a look at today.
I ask you to work together with your colleagues from Belarus and Kazakhstan to address these matters as rapidly as possible and complete the work.
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April 30, 2014, The Kremlin, Moscow