Valdai Club

The international forces in Afghanistan play a positive role but are not operating very effectively, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said on Friday at a meeting with members of the Valdai discussion club.

Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said the current political system in Russia remains effective and that any change will be "evolutionary.""We do not believe that it has fully exhausted itself, but we are not going to stand in place," Putin said at a meeting with members of the Valdai discussion club.

The current trend towards increasing social and defense spending, and raising salaries is destabilizing the financial policy and to a certain extent, is scaring off foreign investors. This trend will have negative consequences in medium term.

It is a mistaken premise to expect modernization to be initiated from the top. A modern economy cannot develop in Russia without reforming its political institutions, such as the elections, the courts and the law enforcement agencies.