Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has praised the government over
measures against the economic recession, ITAR-TASS reports.
Special praise was reserved for the unemployment reduction program.
The unemployment level dropped by 2 million people this year.
Medvedev said that the government is a structure that works non-stop.
He expressed hope that the government will someday start working on
strategic issues only, such as the situation with the airports.
Vladimir Putin thanked Medvedev for working as "a unified team",
noting that such work would have been impossible without his support.
However, there were differences on some approaches to some problems.
Medvedev and Putin expressed different opinions on the evaluation of
the USSR. Medvedev proposed changing the topic of inter-ethnic
conflicts at the State Council at the very last moment, Putin was
bringing the inter-ethnic world in the USSR as an example. Medvedev
had a critical opinion on the USSR, calling it a 'very harsh state'.
Concerning Khodorkovsky, Medvedev said that neither the president, nor
any other official should express position on the case until a
sentence is passed. Last week Prime Minister Vladimir Putin called the
former head of Yukos guilty before a court decision was made.
The differences between Medvedev and Putin gave grounds to analysts
and media for conclusions on the disagreements between the two
officials, which may be a start for the presidential elections'
campaign in 2012.
