Putin: Russia’s unemployment grows, but not dramatically

MOSCOW, Jun 15 (PRIME) -- Russia’s unemployment rate has increased to around 6% in light of the coronavirus pandemic, but the growth is not as dramatic as in other states with unemployment jumping to 11–16%, President Vladimir Putin said on Monday.

“Unemployment has increased by around 1.5 percentage points. It looks not as dramatic as in other states with unemployment jumping to 11% or to 16%. We had nearly 4.5% and now have around 6%,” he said.

Putin also said that Russia managed to act proactively and smooth the consequences of the pandemic for the economy and the people.

“We had to solve two problems: how to protect people and to act proactively. We have generally coped with it. We needed to seize the spread of the epidemic and to mitigate, to smooth its negative social and economic consequences,” he said.

The president also said he hopes that Russian airlines will benefit from effective development of internal tourism.

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