Transcript of the beginning of the meeting:

Vladimir Putin: Mr Ackermann, ladies and gentlemen.

I am pleased to welcome you here in Moscow. You have taken a very wise decision to hold a meeting of your consultative board in Moscow. We appreciate it. Deutsche Bank is our longstanding partner and has been working in Russia since 1881. Over that time, we have made significant progress in various areas of cooperation.

It would take ages to describe everything that Deutsche Bank is doing in Russia. However, I would like to focus on one project: this year, for the first time, Russia’s Finance Ministry placed its rouble-denominated domestic bonds on international markets. Deutsche Bank was among the institutions that helped Russia with this. I would like to thank you for your cooperation. The project has gone very smoothly. I hope that you are satisfied too, and that you have noticed that Russia’s economy is gradually stabilising. I believe this improvement will create a favourable environment for the Deutsche Bank as well as other German financial institutions, and for our partners in non-financial sectors. I am very glad to see you. Welcome!

Josef Ackermann (via interpreter): Thank you, Mr Prime Minister. I am also very pleased to meet with you. We have had a lot of meetings where we discussed economic cooperation between Russia and Germany, which has been developing in a positive direction.

I treasure the memory of your speech in Berlin last year, as well as the opportunity we had to discuss future economic cooperation among Russia, Germany and Europe at the Suddeutsche Zeitung economic forum along with Mr Loescher (Peter Loescher, President and CEO of Siemens AG) and a representative of Volkswagen.

So we were happy to take this new opportunity to bring other members of our bank’s consultative board to Moscow for this meeting, so that they could get to know Moscow and Russia better.

I remember you proposing in Berlin to establish a free trade zone between Russia and the European Union. The business community in Germany eagerly supported that idea. Mr Reitzle (Wolfgang Reitzle, CEO of The Linde Group) actively promoted the idea later at a conference on international security policy.

I am convinced that Europe’s future depends on cooperation with Russia and that Russia is an important part of this continent. I am very grateful for the spirit you bring to our meetings and contacts, and for your emphasis time and again on how we must work together as closely as possible.

You have mentioned the Russian Foreign Ministry’s bond issue; for us, it was not just a success but a landmark and prestigious event. I discussed the possibility with Mr Kudrin for a long time – several years in fact – at the St Petersburg Economic Forum. We were greatly honoured to take part in the issue.

We always meet in good places. I enjoy visiting Russia and I will have the pleasure of coming to Moscow three more times this year. The first opportunity is in connection with my membership in the Foreign Investment Advisory Council (FIAC). The second is due to my membership in the consultative committee, which deals with the formation of the International Financial Centre in Moscow. The third visit will probably be the most pleasant of all. I will attend the celebration of Sberbank’s 170^th anniversary. I was invited to attend during my latest meeting with my friend German Gref.