Putin: Russia needs stronger democracy, freedom in all spheres

MOSCOW, Mar 1 (PRIME) -- Russia should widen freedoms and strengthen democratic principles, President Vladimir Putin said in his address to the Federal Assembly on Thursday.

“To move forward, develop dynamically, we need to extend freedoms in all spheres, strengthen our democratic institutions, local governance, structures of the civil society, courts,” he told both chambers of parliament.

The country has weathered new economic and social challenges to ensure the state’s integrity. The current macroeconomic stability is a good basis for a long-term economic leap forward, the president said.

Russia has not reached the living standards it deserves, but will inevitably reach them, but it will take a breakthrough.

“It is not natural resources or production facilities that determines the role and position of a state in the modern world, but it is the people, conditions for their development, self-realization and creativity of each individual.”

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