139-479: VTB Bank ( Russian : ПАО Банк ВТБ , lit. ' PJSC Bank VTB'; formerly known as Vneshtorgbank , Внешторгбанк , lit. 'International Trade Bank') is a Russian majority state-owned bank headquartered in various federal districts of Russia ; its legal address is registered in St. Petersburg . As of 2022, the company's capital stock was mostly owned by three Russian agencies. VTB Bank and its subsidiaries form
278-649: A constitutional referendum on whether to adopt Russian as a second official language. According to the Central Election Commission, 74.8% voted against, 24.9% voted for and the voter turnout was 71.1%. Starting in 2019, instruction in Russian will be gradually discontinued in private colleges and universities in Latvia, and in general instruction in Latvian public high schools. On 29 September 2022, Saeima passed in
417-606: A decree to provide housing to war veterans. On 8 May 2008, Dmitry Medvedev appointed Putin Prime Minister of Russia as he had promised during his election campaign. The nomination was approved by the State Duma with a clear majority of 392–56, with only Communist Party of the Russian Federation deputies voting against. On 12 May 2008, Putin proposed the list of names for his new cabinet which Medvedev approved. Most of
556-510: A new education law which requires all schools to teach at least partially in Ukrainian, with provisions while allow indigenous languages and languages of national minorities to be used alongside the national language. The law faced criticism from officials in Russia and Hungary. The 2019 Law of Ukraine "On protecting the functioning of the Ukrainian language as the state language" gives priority to
695-594: A "major banking collapse". In November 2018, the National Bank of Ukraine declared the Ukrainian subsidiary of VTB Bank insolvent due to its declining liquidity and worsening financial position. In December 2018, it was announced that VTB Bank would be acquiring controlling stakes in Sarovbusinessbank (81.1%) and Zapsibcombank (71.8%). VTB Bank took over 15 banks between 2002 and February 2019: On 24 July 2015, an agreement, which as approved by Dmitry Medvedev ,
834-566: A St. Petersburg-based timber company. Medvedev aided the company in developing a strategy as the firm launched a significant expansion. Medvedev received 20% of the company's stock. In the next seven years Ilim Pulp Enterprise became Russia's largest lumber company with an annual revenue of around $ 500 million. Medvedev sold his shares in ILP in 1999. He then took his first job at the central government of Russia. The profits realised by Medvedev are unknown. In June 1996, Medvedev's colleague Vladimir Putin
973-475: A child, Medvedev was intellectually curious, described by his first-grade teacher Vera Smirnova as a "dreadful why-asker". After school, he would spend some time playing with his friends before hurrying home to work on his assignments. In the third grade, Medvedev studied the ten-volume Small Soviet Encyclopedia belonging to his father. In the second and third grades, he showed interest in dinosaurs and memorised Earth's primary geologic development periods , from
1112-534: A formula with V standing for the nucleus (vowel) and C for each consonant, the maximal structure can be described as follows: (C)(C)(C)(C)V(C)(C)(C)(C) Dmitry Medvedev Dmitry Anatolyevich Medvedev (born 14 September 1965) is a Russian politician who has been serving as deputy chairman of the Security Council of Russia since 2020. Medvedev was also the president of Russia from 2008 to 2012 and prime minister of Russia from 2012 to 2020. Medvedev
1251-471: A gold chain of double-headed eagles symbolising the presidency, he stated: I believe my most important aims will be to protect civil and economic freedoms... We must fight for a true respect of the law and overcome legal nihilism, which seriously hampers modern development. His inauguration coincided with the celebration of the Victory Day on 9 May. He attended the military parade at Red Square and signed
1390-558: A hard or soft counterpart, and the distinction is a prominent feature of the language, which is usually shown in writing not by a change of the consonant but rather by changing the following vowel. Another important aspect is the reduction of unstressed vowels . Stress , which is often unpredictable, is not normally indicated orthographically , though an optional acute accent may be used to mark stress – such as to distinguish between homographic words (e.g. замо́к [ zamók , 'lock'] and за́мок [ zámok , 'castle']), or to indicate
1529-540: A keynote speech at the Fifth Krasnoyarsk Economic Forum, saying that: Freedom is better than non-freedom – this principle should be at the core of our politics. I mean freedom in all its manifestations – personal freedom, economic freedom and, finally, freedom of expression. In the Krasnoyarsk speech, Medvedev harshly condemned Russia's " legal nihilism " and highlighted the need to ensure
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#17328834047421668-479: A language that "belongs to the European cultural space". The financing of Russian-language content by the state will cease, which the concept says create a "unified information space". However, one inevitable consequence would be the closure of public media broadcasts in Russian on LTV and Latvian Radio, as well as the closure of LSM's Russian-language service. In Lithuania , Russian has no official or legal status, but
1807-518: A leading Russian financial group – VTB Group uniting VTB banks located in different countries and offering a wide range of corporate banking services and products in Russia, CIS , Europe, Asia, Africa, and the U.S. VTB was ranked 446th on the FT Global 500 2012, The Financial Times ’ annual snapshot of the world's largest companies. It climbed to 210th in the ranking of the 500 largest companies in Europe,
1946-572: A lesser extent the languages to the south and the east: Uralic , Turkic , Persian , Arabic , and Hebrew . According to the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, California , Russian is classified as a level III language in terms of learning difficulty for native English speakers, requiring approximately 1,100 hours of immersion instruction to achieve intermediate fluency. Feudal divisions and conflicts created obstacles between
2085-535: A list of candidates not containing Putin himself, Medvedev often came out first, beating Ivanov and Zubkov as well as the opposition candidates. In November 2006, Medvedev's trust rating was 17%, more than double than that of Ivanov. Medvedev's popularity was probably boosted by his high-profile role in the National Priority Projects . Many observers were surprised on 10 December 2007 when President Putin introduced Medvedev as his preferred successor. This
2224-554: A loss of 612.6 billion rubles ($ 7.7 billion), mainly due to sanctions. VTB's major subsidiaries as of April 2022 were: VTB is one of the sponsors of all Dinamo Moscow sport clubs. Since 2017, VTB Bank has been the title partner of the Russian Formula 1 stage in Sochi – Formula 1 VTB Russian Grand Prix. Since 2016, VTB has been the tennis tournament VTB Kremlin Cup . VTB has also been
2363-687: A major democratic politician of the 1980s and 1990s was one of Medvedev's professors at the university. In 1988, Medvedev joined Sobchak's team of democrats and served as the de facto head of Sobchak's successful campaign for a seat in the new Soviet parliament, the Congress of People's Deputies of the USSR. After Sobchak's election campaign Medvedev continued his academic career in the position of docent ( associate professor ) at his alma mater, now renamed Saint Petersburg State University . He taught civil and Roman law until 1999. According to one student, Medvedev
2502-607: A minority language under the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities . 30% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 2% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. In Azerbaijan , Russian has no official status, but is a lingua franca of the country. 26% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 5% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. In Georgia , Russian has no official status, but it
2641-638: A new, more liberal period in Russian politics". Since the lead up to the Russian invasion of Ukraine , he has adopted increasingly hawkish and anti-Western positions, and has repeatedly threatened the use of nuclear weapons in a break with his previous image as a moderate subordinate to Putin. According to analysts, he has limited influence in the Kremlin. Former Prime Minister of Russia Former President of Russia Political views Elections Presidency Premiership [REDACTED] Dmitry Medvedev
2780-516: A qualitatively new entity can be said to emerge—the general language of the working class... capitalism has the tendency of creating the general urban language of a given society. In 2010, there were 259.8 million speakers of Russian in the world: in Russia – 137.5 million, in the CIS and Baltic countries – 93.7 million, in Eastern Europe – 12.9 million, Western Europe – 7.3 million, Asia – 2.7 million, in
2919-522: A total of 95.7 billion rubles ($ 3.1 billion) for the assets, included the investment funds Generali , TPG Capital , China Investment Corp , a sovereign wealth fund responsible for managing China's foreign exchange reserves , and companies affiliated with businessman Suleyman Kerimov . In May 2013 VTB completed a secondary public offering (SPO), issuing 2.5 trillion new additional shares by public subscription. All shares were placed on Moscow's primary stock exchange . The government did not participate in
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#17328834047423058-539: A tour guide at Pavlovsk Palace . The Medvedevs lived in a 40m apartment at 6 Bela Kun Street in the Kupchino Municipal Okrug (district) of Leningrad. Dmitry was his parents' only child. The Medvedevs were regarded at the time as a Soviet intelligentsia family. His maternal grandparents were Ukrainians whose surname was Kovalev, originally Koval . Medvedev traces his family roots to the Belgorod region. As
3197-441: A turnout of 69.78% of registered voters. The main contenders, Gennady Zyuganov and Vladimir Zhirinovsky , received 17.72% and 9.35% respectively. Three-quarters of Medvedev's vote was Putin's electorate. According to surveys, had Putin and Medvedev both run for president in the same elections, Medvedev would have received 9% of the vote. The fairness of the election was disputed by international observers. Andreas Gross, head of
3336-527: Is Belarusian, among ethnic Belarusians this share is 28.5%; the highest share of those who speak Belarusian at home is among ethnic Poles — 46.0%. In Estonia , Russian is spoken by 29.6% of the population, according to a 2011 estimate from the World Factbook, and is officially considered a foreign language. School education in the Russian language is a very contentious point in Estonian politics, and in 2022,
3475-475: Is a co-official language per article 5 of the Constitution of Kyrgyzstan . The 2009 census states that 482,200 people speak Russian as a native language, or 8.99% of the population. Additionally, 1,854,700 residents of Kyrgyzstan aged 15 and above fluently speak Russian as a second language, or 49.6% of the population in the age group. In Tajikistan , Russian is the language of inter-ethnic communication under
3614-401: Is a high degree of mutual intelligibility between Russian, Belarusian and Ukrainian , and a moderate degree of it in all modern Slavic languages, at least at the conversational level. Russian is written using a Cyrillic alphabet. The Russian alphabet consists of 33 letters. The following table gives their forms, along with IPA values for each letter's typical sound: Older letters of
3753-593: Is a post-posed definite article -to , -ta , -te similar to that existing in Bulgarian and Macedonian. In the Southern Russian dialects , instances of unstressed /e/ and /a/ following palatalized consonants and preceding a stressed syllable are not reduced to [ɪ] (as occurs in the Moscow dialect), being instead pronounced [a] in such positions (e.g. несл и is pronounced [nʲaˈslʲi] , not [nʲɪsˈlʲi] ) – this
3892-647: Is an East Slavic language belonging to the Balto-Slavic branch of the Indo-European language family . It is one of the four extant East Slavic languages, and is the native language of the Russians . It was the de facto and de jure official language of the former Soviet Union . Russian has remained an official language of the Russian Federation , Belarus , Kazakhstan , Kyrgyzstan , and Tajikistan , and
4031-485: Is being used less frequently by Russian-speaking typists in favor of the extension of Unicode character encoding , which fully incorporates the Russian alphabet. Free programs are available offering this Unicode extension, which allow users to type Russian characters, even on Western 'QWERTY' keyboards. The Russian language was first introduced to computing after the M-1 , and MESM models were produced in 1951. According to
4170-613: Is called yakanye ( яканье ). Consonants include a fricative /ɣ/ , a semivowel /w⁓u̯/ and /x⁓xv⁓xw/ , whereas the Standard and Northern dialects have the consonants /ɡ/ , /v/ , and final /l/ and /f/ , respectively. The morphology features a palatalized final /tʲ/ in 3rd person forms of verbs (this is unpalatalized in the Standard and Northern dialects). During the Proto-Slavic (Common Slavic) times all Slavs spoke one mutually intelligible language or group of dialects. There
4309-569: Is less than 50 percent or which one or more blocked persons may control by means other than a majority ownership interest". On 1 September 2014, VTB was added to the Australian autonomous sanctions list for Russia, Crimea, and Sevastopol. On 12 September 2014, the United States issues a consolidated listing of directives associated with Executive Order 13662 sanctions during the crisis in Ukraine. For
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4448-563: Is more spoken than English. Sizable Russian-speaking communities also exist in North America, especially in large urban centers of the US and Canada, such as New York City , Philadelphia , Boston , Los Angeles , Nashville , San Francisco , Seattle , Spokane , Toronto , Calgary , Baltimore , Miami , Portland , Chicago , Denver , and Cleveland . In a number of locations they issue their own newspapers, and live in ethnic enclaves (especially
4587-564: Is odd") – чу́дно ( chúdno – "this is marvellous"), молоде́ц ( molodéts – "well done!") – мо́лодец ( mólodets – "fine young man"), узна́ю ( uznáyu – "I shall learn it") – узнаю́ ( uznayú – "I recognize it"), отреза́ть ( otrezát – "to be cutting") – отре́зать ( otrézat – "to have cut"); to indicate the proper pronunciation of uncommon words, especially personal and family names, like афе́ра ( aféra , "scandal, affair"), гу́ру ( gúru , "guru"), Гарси́я ( García ), Оле́ша ( Olésha ), Фе́рми ( Fermi ), and to show which
4726-402: Is recognized as a minority language under the Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities . Russian is the language of 9% of the population according to the World Factbook. Ethnologue cites Russian as the country's de facto working language. In China , Russian has no official status, but it is spoken by the small Russian communities in the northeastern Heilongjiang and
4865-569: Is sometimes considered to have played a significant role in the formation of modern Russian. Also, Russian has notable lexical similarities with Bulgarian due to a common Church Slavonic influence on both languages, but because of later interaction in the 19th and 20th centuries, Bulgarian grammar differs markedly from Russian. Over the course of centuries, the vocabulary and literary style of Russian have also been influenced by Western and Central European languages such as Greek, Latin , Polish , Dutch , German, French, Italian, and English, and to
5004-576: Is spoken by 14.2% of the population according to an undated estimate from the World Factbook. In 2005, Russian was the most widely taught foreign language in Mongolia, and was compulsory in Year 7 onward as a second foreign language in 2006. Around 1.5 million Israelis spoke Russian as of 2017. The Israeli press and websites regularly publish material in Russian and there are Russian newspapers, television stations, schools, and social media outlets based in
5143-610: Is still commonly used as a lingua franca in Ukraine , Moldova , the Caucasus , Central Asia , and to a lesser extent in the Baltic states and Israel . Russian has over 258 million total speakers worldwide. It is the most spoken native language in Europe , the most spoken Slavic language , as well as the most geographically widespread language of Eurasia . It is the world's seventh-most spoken language by number of native speakers , and
5282-518: Is the stressed word in a sentence, for example Ты́ съел печенье? ( Tý syel pechenye? – "Was it you who ate the cookie?") – Ты съе́л печенье? ( Ty syél pechenye? – "Did you eat the cookie?) – Ты съел пече́нье? ( Ty syel pechénye? "Was it the cookie you ate?"). Stress marks are mandatory in lexical dictionaries and books for children or Russian learners. The Russian syllable structure can be quite complex, with both initial and final consonant clusters of up to four consecutive sounds. Using
5421-483: Is this personal chemistry: I trust him. I just trust him. As 2 March 2008 election approached, the outgoing president, Vladimir Putin, remained the country's most popular politician. An opinion poll by Russia's independent polling organisation, the Levada Center, conducted over the period 21–24 December 2007, indicated that when presented a list of potential candidates, 79% of Russians were ready to vote for Medvedev if
5560-479: The 2008 Beijing Olympics . At about 1:00 a.m on 8 August, Medvedev held a telephone conversation with the Defence Minister, Anatoliy Serdyukov . It is likely that during this conversation, Medvedev authorised the use of force against Georgia. The next day, Medvedev released a statement, in which he said: Last night, Georgian troops committed what amounts to an act of aggression against Russian peacekeepers and
5699-516: The 2008 South Ossetia war —changed Putin's plans and caused him to resume a stronger role in Russian politics. The long-lingering conflict between Georgia and the separatist regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia , which were supported by Russia, escalated during the summer of 2008. On 1 August 2008, the Russian-backed South Ossetian forces started shelling Georgian villages, with a sporadic response from Georgian peacekeepers in
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5838-461: The 2011 Lithuanian census , Russian was the native language for 7.2% of the population. In Moldova , Russian was considered to be the language of interethnic communication under a Soviet-era law. On 21 January 2021, the Constitutional Court of Moldova declared the law unconstitutional and deprived Russian of the status of the language of interethnic communication. 50% of the population
5977-916: The Apollo–Soyuz mission, which first flew in 1975. In March 2013, Russian was found to be the second-most used language on websites after English. Russian was the language of 5.9% of all websites, slightly ahead of German and far behind English (54.7%). Russian was used not only on 89.8% of .ru sites, but also on 88.7% of sites with the former Soviet Union domain .su . Websites in former Soviet Union member states also used high levels of Russian: 79.0% in Ukraine, 86.9% in Belarus, 84.0% in Kazakhstan, 79.6% in Uzbekistan, 75.9% in Kyrgyzstan and 81.8% in Tajikistan. However, Russian
6116-617: The Central Election Commission on 20 December 2007 and said he would step down as chairman of Gazprom, since under the current laws, the president is not permitted to hold another post. His registration was formally accepted as valid by the Russian Central Election Commission on 21 January 2008. Describing his reasons for endorsing Medvedev, Putin said: I am confident that he will be a good president and an effective manager. But besides other things, there
6255-413: The Constitution of Tajikistan and is permitted in official documentation. 28% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 7% used it as the main language with family, friends or at work. The World Factbook notes that Russian is widely used in government and business. In Turkmenistan , Russian lost its status as the official lingua franca in 1996. Among 12% of the population who grew up in
6394-491: The Leningrad City Council . Sobchak hired Medvedev who had previously headed his election campaign. One of Sobchak's former students, Vladimir Putin , became an adviser. The next summer, Sobchak was elected Mayor of the city, and Medvedev became a consultant to City Hall's Committee for Foreign Affairs. It was headed by Putin. In November 1993, Medvedev became the legal affairs director of Ilim Pulp Enterprise (ILP),
6533-591: The Leningrad State University Faculty of Law in 1987 (together with Ilya Yeliseyev, Artur Parfenchikov , Anton Ivanov , Nikolay Vinnichenko and Konstantin Chuychenko , who later became associates). After graduating, Medvedev considered joining the prosecutor's office to become an investigator however, he took an opportunity to pursue graduate studies at the civil law department, deciding to accept three budget-funded post-graduate students to work at
6672-482: The National Bank of Ukraine declares the Ukrainian subsidiary of VTB Bank insolvent due to its declining liquidity and worsening financial position. On 25 June 2020 European Court of Justice rejected VTB and Sberbank bank's 2014 lawsuit against EU sectoral sanctions citing that regulators were within their aims of " imposing a cost on the Russian government " because of the latter's actions in Ukraine. The Court specified that intentionally ambiguous language versions of
6811-444: The National Priority Projects would be raised by 260 billion rubles for 2008. Medvedev's election campaign was relatively low-key and, like his predecessor, Medvedev refused to take part in televised debates, citing his high workload as first deputy prime minister as the reason. Instead, Medvedev preferred to present his views on his election website Medvedev2008.ru . In January 2008, Medvedev launched his campaign with stops in
6950-580: The New START nuclear arms reduction treaty. Russia won the Russo-Georgian War , and recovered from the Great Recession . Medvedev also launched an anti-corruption campaign , yet was later being accused of corruption himself. He served a single term in office and was succeeded by Putin following the 2012 presidential election . Putin then appointed Medvedev as prime minister. He resigned along with
7089-526: The Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE) mission, stated that the elections were "neither free nor fair". Moreover, the few western vote monitors bemoaned the inequality of candidate registration and the abuse of administrative resources by Medvedev allowing blanket television coverage. Russian programmer Shpilkin analysed the results of Medvedev's election and came to the conclusion that
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#17328834047427228-575: The Ukrainian language in more than 30 spheres of public life: in particular in public administration , media, education, science, culture, advertising, services . The law does not regulate private communication. A poll conducted in March 2022 by RATING in the territory controlled by Ukraine found that 83% of the respondents believe that Ukrainian should be the only state language of Ukraine. This opinion dominates in all macro-regions, age and language groups. On
7367-638: The United States Census , in 2007 Russian was the primary language spoken in the homes of over 850,000 individuals living in the United States. Russian is one of the official languages (or has similar status and interpretation must be provided into Russian) of the following: The Russian language is also one of two official languages aboard the International Space Station – NASA astronauts who serve alongside Russian cosmonauts usually take Russian language courses. This practice goes back to
7506-539: The oblasts . On 22 January 2008, Medvedev held what was effectively his first campaign speech at Russia's second Civic Forum, advocating a liberal-conservative agenda for modernising Russia. Medvedev argued that Russia needed "decades of stable development" because the country had "exhausted its share of revolutions and social upheavals back in the twentieth century". Medvedev therefore emphasised liberal modernisation while still aiming to continue his predecessor's agenda of stabilisation. On 15 February 2008, Medvedev held
7645-461: The 20th century, Russian was a mandatory language taught in the schools of the members of the old Warsaw Pact and in other countries that used to be satellites of the USSR. According to the Eurobarometer 2005 survey, fluency in Russian remains fairly high (20–40%) in some countries, in particular former Warsaw Pact countries. In Armenia , Russian has no official status, but it is recognized as
7784-520: The Archean up to the Cenozoic. In the fourth and fifth grades he demonstrated interest in chemistry, conducting elementary experiments. He was involved to some degree with sport. In grade seven, his adolescent curiosity blossomed through his relationship with Svetlana Linnik , his future wife, who was studying at the same school in a parallel class. This apparently affected Medvedev's school performance. He calls
7923-448: The Bank of Moscow through its parent bank, VTB Bank OAO, and other entities that VTB has 50 percent or greater ownership either individually or in the aggregate, either directly or indirectly. Also, US persons cannot use a third-party intermediary, and they must use caution during "transactions with a non-blocked entity in which one or more blocked persons has a significant ownership interest that
8062-465: The Belarusian society the Russian language prevails, so according to the 2019 census 6,718,557 people (71.4% of the total population) stated that they speak Russian at home, for ethnic Belarusians this share is 61.4%, for Russians — 97.2%, for Ukrainians — 89.0%, for Poles — 52.4%, and for Jews — 96.6%; 2,447,764 people (26.0% of the total population) stated that the language they usually speak at home
8201-636: The FT Europe 500 2014, and to 127th in the FT Emerging 500 2014, the list of the 500 largest companies in the world's emerging markets. VTB Bank (PJSC) has 22 branches and 3 representative offices in 13 regions of Russia and 4 foreign countries. VTB Bank was founded as Vneshtorgbank in 1990 with the support of the Russian State Bank and the Ministry of Finance . It was set up as a limited liability company with
8340-519: The Great and developed from the Moscow ( Middle or Central Russian ) dialect substratum under the influence of some of the previous century's Russian chancery language. Prior to the Bolshevik Revolution , the spoken form of the Russian language was that of the nobility and the urban bourgeoisie. Russian peasants, the great majority of the population, continued to speak in their own dialects. However,
8479-578: The Institute of Russian Language of the Russian Academy of Sciences, an optional acute accent ( знак ударения ) may, and sometimes should, be used to mark stress . For example, it is used to distinguish between otherwise identical words, especially when context does not make it obvious: замо́к ( zamók – "lock") – за́мок ( zámok – "castle"), сто́ящий ( stóyashchy – "worthwhile") – стоя́щий ( stoyáshchy – "standing"), чудно́ ( chudnó – "this
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#17328834047428618-540: The Kremlin's investment in Facebook. On 7 May 2014, VTB transferred most of its DST Investment 3 to Kanton. In 2014, before Russo-Ukrainian War , VTB Bank was one of the biggest banks of Ukraine . Since 2014, the bank has been subject to political sanctions (see separate section below). In August 2018, it was announced that VTB Bank would acquire a 75% stake in Vozrozhdenie Bank after its previous owners oversaw
8757-515: The Middle East and North Africa – 1.3 million, Sub-Saharan Africa – 0.1 million, Latin America – 0.2 million, U.S., Canada , Australia, and New Zealand – 4.1 million speakers. Therefore, the Russian language is the seventh-largest in the world by the number of speakers , after English, Mandarin, Hindi -Urdu, Spanish, French, Arabic, and Portuguese. Russian is one of the six official languages of
8896-440: The Russian Federation that same year and the United Kingdom list from 1 August. On 6 August 2014, VTB was added to the Canadian sanctions list due to its role in the Russo-Ukrainian War and the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 . On 13 August 2014, the United States clarifies entities under sectoral sanctions. United States increases its sectoral sanctions on VTB Bank together with its subsidiaries (“the VTB Group”) and
9035-807: The Russian alphabet include ⟨ ѣ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ е ⟩ ( /je/ or /ʲe/ ); ⟨ і ⟩ and ⟨ ѵ ⟩ , which both merged to ⟨ и ⟩ ( /i/ ); ⟨ ѳ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ ф ⟩ ( /f/ ); ⟨ ѫ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ у ⟩ ( /u/ ); ⟨ ѭ ⟩ , which merged to ⟨ ю ⟩ ( /ju/ or /ʲu/ ); and ⟨ ѧ ⟩ and ⟨ ѩ ⟩ , which later were graphically reshaped into ⟨ я ⟩ and merged phonetically to /ja/ or /ʲa/ . While these older letters have been abandoned at one time or another, they may be used in this and related articles. The yers ⟨ ъ ⟩ and ⟨ ь ⟩ originally indicated
9174-431: The Russian financial sector, Directive 1 was amended to increase the financial sanctions on the Russian financial sector for "all transactions in, provision of financing for, and other dealings" in new equity or new debt issued on or after 12 September 2014 to longer than 30 days maturity . New equity or new debt issued from 29 July 2018 until 12 September 2018 was sanctioned if longer than 90 days maturity . In 2015,
9313-446: The Russian financial sector, Directive 1 was amended to increase the financial sanctions on the Russian financial sector for "all transactions in, provision of financing for, and other dealings" in new equity or new debt issued on or after 28 November 2017 to longer than 14 days maturity . New equity or new debt issued from 12 September 2014 until 28 November 2017 was sanctioned if longer than 30 days maturity . On 27 November 2018,
9452-600: The Russian government's share in VTB from 75.5 percent to 60.9 percent. In 2022, VTB Bank extended a 630 billion ruble ($ 11.06 billion) credit line to be used for the purchase, repair and modernisation of the country's railway infrastructure. In 2011, VTB invested more than $ 191 million for shares in the Isle of Man company DST Investment 3 which was roughly than half of the funds in Yuri Milner 's DST Global . This led to Milner's large stake in Twitter. Kanton had almost no investment in Twitter. DST Investment 3 also issued shares to Alisher Usmanov 's Kanton that were used to support
9591-458: The Russian principalities before and especially during Mongol rule. This strengthened dialectal differences, and for a while, prevented the emergence of a standardized national language. The formation of the unified and centralized Russian state in the 15th and 16th centuries, and the gradual re-emergence of a common political, economic, and cultural space created the need for a common standard language. The initial impulse for standardization came from
9730-434: The SPO, so its stake in the bank decreased to 60.9% after the subscription closed. The bank raised 102.5 billion rubles worth of additional capital. Three sovereign wealth funds, Norway's Norges Bank Investment Management, Qatar Holding LLC and the State Oil Fund of the Republic of Azerbaijan (SOFAZ) and commercial bank China Construction Bank became the largest investors during the SPO, after purchasing more than half of
9869-405: The Soviet era can speak Russian, other generations of citizens that do not have any knowledge of Russian. Primary and secondary education by Russian is almost non-existent. In Uzbekistan , Russian is the language of inter-ethnic communication. It has some official roles, being permitted in official documentation and is the lingua franca of the country and the language of the elite. Russian
10008-460: The United Nations. Education in Russian is still a popular choice for both Russian as a second language (RSL) and native speakers in Russia, and in many former Soviet republics. Russian is still seen as an important language for children to learn in most of the former Soviet republics. In Belarus , Russian is a second state language alongside Belarusian per the Constitution of Belarus . 77% of
10147-416: The additional shares issued. In 2017, the main shareholder of VTB was the Russian government , which owned 60.9% of the lender through its Federal Agency for State Property Management . The remaining shares were split between holders of its Global Depository Receipts and minority shareholders, both individuals and companies. As of February 2022, the bank reported that its stock shares were distributed in
10286-594: The aim of servicing Russia's foreign trade operations and promoting Russia's integration into the global economy . In 2004, the bank acquired a majority stake of 85.8% in Guta Bank, which was reorganised into a retail bank, Vneshtorgbank 24 (VTB24). The bank also acquired the Armenian Armsberbank, which was later renamed VTB Armenia. In 2005, the bank acquired 75% plus three shares of the Promstroybank (PSB), which
10425-574: The area. Intensifying artillery attacks by the South Ossetians broke a 1992 ceasefire agreement. To put an end to these attacks, the Georgian army units were sent in to the South Ossetian conflict zone on 7 August. Georgian troops took control of most of Tskhinvali, a separatist stronghold, in hours. At the time of the attack, Medvedev was on vacation and Putin was attending the opening ceremony of
10564-482: The banks' chief Executive Andrei Kostin predicted loses for the bank in the years to come because of the plunging ruble accelerated by international sanctions . On 15 March 2017, Ukraine imposed sanctions against VTB Bank and subsidiaries because of the ongoing Russian interference in Ukraine. On 28 November 2017, the United States increases the Executive Order 13662 sanctions to the Russian financial sector. For
10703-403: The broader sense of expanding the use of Russian alongside or in favour of other languages. The current standard form of Russian is generally regarded as the modern Russian literary language ( современный русский литературный язык – "sovremenny russky literaturny yazyk"). It arose at the beginning of the 18th century with the modernization reforms of the Russian state under the rule of Peter
10842-609: The city. In 2018, the number of trips exceeded 3 million. On 29 July 2014, the Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) published that the Bank of Moscow and VTB Bank OJSC , the second-largest bank in Russia, has been added to the Sectoral Sanctions Identifications List . On 31 July 2014, VTB Bank and its subsidiaries was added to the European Union sanctions list due to its role in the annexation of Crimea by
10981-541: The civilian population in South Ossetia ... In accordance with the Constitution and the federal laws, as President of the Russian Federation it is my duty to protect the lives and dignity of Russian citizens wherever they may be. It is these circumstances that dictate the steps we will take now. We will not allow the deaths of our fellow citizens to go unpunished. The perpetrators will receive the punishment they deserve. In
11120-414: The constitutionally powerful president was now flanked with a highly influential prime minister (Putin), who also remained the country's most popular politician. Previous prime ministers had proven to be almost completely subordinate to the president and none of them had enjoyed strong public approval, with Yevgeny Primakov and Putin's previous tenure (1999–2000) as prime minister under Boris Yeltsin being
11259-562: The country. There is an Israeli TV channel mainly broadcasting in Russian with Israel Plus . See also Russian language in Israel . Russian is also spoken as a second language by a small number of people in Afghanistan . In Vietnam , Russian has been added in the elementary curriculum along with Chinese and Japanese and were named as "first foreign languages" for Vietnamese students to learn, on equal footing with English. The Russian language
11398-478: The current head of Leto Bank, as the head of Post Bank (Russia). On 28 January 2016, sets of documents were signed between VTB24 and Russian Post on establishing the Post Bank. Russian Post purchased 50 percent minus one share of the newly established Post Bank through its 100 percent subsidiary. The remaining 50 percent plus one share is owned by VTB24 of VTB Bank. Dmitry Rudenko, the head of Leto Bank of VTB24, became
11537-488: The department itself. During his post-graduate studies, Medvedev met Konstantin Aranovsky , whom, in 2010, he nominated as a judge in the Constitutional Court of Russia . In 1990, Medvedev defended his dissertation titled, "Problems of Realisation of Civil Juridical Personality of State Enterprise" and received his Doctor of Juridical Science ( Candidate of Juridical Sciences ) degree in civil law . Anatoly Sobchak ,
11676-462: The early hours of 8 August, Russian military forces launched a counter-offensive against Georgian troops. After five days of heavy fighting, all Georgian forces were routed from South Ossetia and Abkhazia. On 12 August, Medvedev ended the Russian military operation, entitled "Operation to force Georgia into peace". Later on the same day, a peace deal brokered by the French and EU president, Nicolas Sarkozy ,
11815-573: The election was immediately held. The other main contenders, the Communist Gennady Zyuganov and the LDPR 's Vladimir Zhirinovsky both received in 9% in the same poll. Much of Putin's popularity transferred to his chosen candidate, with 42% of the survey responders saying that Medvedev's strength came from Putin's support to him. In his first speech after being endorsed, Medvedev stated that, as president, he would appoint Vladimir Putin to
11954-413: The factory and the industrial plant their local peasant dialects with their phonetics, grammar, and vocabulary, and the very process of recruiting workers from peasants and the mobility of the worker population generate another process: the liquidation of peasant inheritance by way of leveling the particulars of local dialects. On the ruins of peasant multilingual, in the context of developing heavy industry,
12093-427: The federal budget, was not enough to significantly overhaul Russia's infrastructure. According to opinion polls, most Russians believed the money invested in the projects had been spent ineffectively. Following his appointment as first deputy prime minister, many political observers began to regard Medvedev as a potential candidate for the 2008 presidential elections, although Western observers widely believed Medvedev
12232-451: The final reading amendments that state that all schools and kindergartens in the country are to transition to education in Latvian . From 2025, all children will be taught in Latvian only. On 28 September 2023, Latvian deputies approved The National Security Concept, according to which from 1 January 2026, all content created by Latvian public media (including LSM ) should be only in Latvian or
12371-409: The first time in 20 years. In their place, Medvedev brought in the so-called civiliki , a network of St. Petersburg civil law scholars preferred by Medvedev for high positions. From the beginning of Medvedev's tenure, the nature of his presidency and his relationship with Putin was subject to considerable media speculation. In a unique situation in the Russian Federation's political history,
12510-1195: The following way: As of April 2022, its Management Committee (referred as VTB Bank Management Board or VTB MB) includes: As of April 2022, VTB's Supervisory Council consists of Anton Siluanov (Chairman of the Supervisory Council), Matthias Warnig (member of the Supervisory Council),[8] Sergey Dubinin (member of supervisory council), Mikhail Zadornov (Member of Supervisory Council), Andrey Kostin (President and Chairman of VTB Bank Management Board), Shahmar Movsumov (Independent member of supervisory council), Igor Repin (Independent member of Supervisory Council), Alexander Sokolov (Member of Supervisory Council), Vladimir Chistyukhin (member of supervisory council), Mukhadin Eskindarov (Member of Supervisory Council). Consolidated Statement of Financial Position as at 31 December 2021: net interest income – 646,3 RUB billion, net fee and commission income – 90,0 RUB billion, operating income before provisions – 822,7 RUB billion, staff costs and administrative expenses – -308,8 RUB billion, net profit – 327,4 RUB billion. The 2022 results showed
12649-672: The generation of immigrants who started arriving in the early 1960s). Only about 25% of them are ethnic Russians, however. Before the dissolution of the Soviet Union , the overwhelming majority of Russophones in Brighton Beach, Brooklyn in New York City were Russian-speaking Jews. Afterward, the influx from the countries of the former Soviet Union changed the statistics somewhat, with ethnic Russians and Ukrainians immigrating along with some more Russian Jews and Central Asians. According to
12788-480: The government bureaucracy for the lack of a reliable tool of communication in administrative, legal, and judicial affairs became an obvious practical problem. The earliest attempts at standardizing Russian were made based on the so-called Moscow official or chancery language, during the 15th to 17th centuries. Since then, the trend of language policy in Russia has been standardization in both the restricted sense of reducing dialectical barriers between ethnic Russians, and
12927-613: The head of Post Bank (Russia). On 28 December 2017, VTB24 sells two shares to Dmitry Rudenko, the Chairman of the Board of Post Bank. VTB 24 and Russia Post have equal shares in Post Bank: each have 50 percent minus one share. VTB24 has 1,062 branches. On 1 January 2018, VTB acquired VTB24. The integrated network has 1,350 branches. In February 2011, the government floated an additional 10% minus two shares of VTB Bank. The private investors, who paid
13066-458: The independence of the country's judicial system and the need for an anti-corruption program. Economically, Medvedev advocated private property, economic deregulation and lower taxes. According to him, Russia's economy should be modernised by focusing on four "I"s: institutions, infrastructure, innovation and investment. Medvedev was elected President of Russia on 2 March 2008. The final election results gave him 70.28% (52,530,712) of votes with
13205-511: The largest international banking IPO at the time. In 2008, the bank acquired a 51% stake in AF Bank in Azerbaijan from AF Holding International , later renaming it VTB Azerbaijan. In 2010, the bank's board approved the phased acquisition of TransCreditBank from Russian Railways . In 2013, VTB carried out a secondary public offering (SPO) which raised 102.5 billion rubles ($ 3.3 billion) and diluted
13344-486: The newly created position of Minister of Sports, Tourism and Youth policy. In the presidential administration, Medvedev replaced Sergei Sobyanin with Sergei Naryshkin as the head of the administration. The head of the Federal Security Service , Nikolai Patrushev , was replaced with Alexander Bortnikov . Medvedev's economic adviser Arkady Dvorkovich and his press attaché Natalya Timakova became part of
13483-516: The northwestern Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region . Russian was also the main foreign language taught in school in China between 1949 and 1964. In Kazakhstan , Russian is not a state language, but according to article 7 of the Constitution of Kazakhstan its usage enjoys equal status to that of the Kazakh language in state and local administration. The 2009 census reported that 10,309,500 people, or 84.8% of
13622-516: The only exceptions. Journalists quickly dubbed the new system with a practically dual-headed executive as "government by tandem" or "tandemocracy", with Medvedev and Putin called the "ruling tandem". Daniel Treisman has argued that early in Medvedev's presidency, Putin seemed ready to disengage and started withdrawing to the background. In the first year of Medvedev's presidency, two external events threatening Russia—the 2007–2008 financial crisis and
13761-515: The other hand, before the war, almost a quarter of Ukrainians were in favour of granting Russian the status of the state language, while after the beginning of Russia's invasion the support for the idea dropped to just 7%. In peacetime, the idea of raising the status of Russian was traditionally supported by residents of the south and east . But even in these regions, only a third of the respondents were in favour, and after Russia's full-scale invasion , their number dropped by almost half. According to
13900-455: The other three languages in the East Slavic branch. In many places in eastern and southern Ukraine and throughout Belarus, these languages are spoken interchangeably, and in certain areas traditional bilingualism resulted in language mixtures such as Surzhyk in eastern Ukraine and Trasianka in Belarus. An East Slavic Old Novgorod dialect , although it vanished during the 15th or 16th century,
14039-446: The parliament approved a bill to close up all Russian language schools and kindergartens by the school year. The transition to only Estonian language schools and kindergartens will start in the 2024-2025 school year. In Latvia , Russian is officially considered a foreign language. 55% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 26% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. On 18 February 2012, Latvia held
14178-453: The peasants' speech was never systematically studied, as it was generally regarded by philologists as simply a source of folklore and an object of curiosity. This was acknowledged by the noted Russian dialectologist Nikolai Karinsky , who toward the end of his life wrote: "Scholars of Russian dialects mostly studied phonetics and morphology. Some scholars and collectors compiled local dictionaries. We have almost no studies of lexical material or
14317-453: The personnel remained unchanged from the period of Putin's initial presidency but there were several high-profile changes. The Minister of Justice , Vladimir Ustinov was replaced by Aleksandr Konovalov ; the Minister of Energy, Viktor Khristenko was replaced with Sergei Shmatko ; the Minister of Communications, Leonid Reiman was replaced with Igor Shchyogolev and Vitaliy Mutko received
14456-455: The population aged 15 and above, could read and write well in Russian, and understand the spoken language. In October 2023, Kazakhstan drafted a media law aimed at increasing the use of the Kazakh language over Russian, the law stipulates that the share of the state language on television and radio should increase from 50% to 70%, at a rate of 5% per year, starting in 2025. In Kyrgyzstan , Russian
14595-418: The population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 67% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. According to the 2019 Belarusian census , out of 9,413,446 inhabitants of the country, 5,094,928 (54.1% of the total population) named Belarusian as their native language, with 61.2% of ethnic Belarusians and 54.5% of ethnic Poles declaring Belarusian as their native language. In everyday life in
14734-414: The post of prime minister to head the Russian government . Although constitutionally barred from a third consecutive presidential term, such a role would allow Putin to continue as an influential figure in Russian politics. Putin pledged that he would accept the position of prime minister should Medvedev be elected president. Although Putin had pledged not to change the distribution of authority between
14873-455: The president and prime minister, many analysts expected a shift in the center of power from the presidency to the prime minister post when Putin assumed the latter under a Medvedev presidency. Election posters portrayed the pair side by side with the slogan "Together We Win" (" Вместе победим "). Medvedev vowed to work closely with Putin once elected. In December 2007, in preparation for his election campaign, Medvedev promised that funding of
15012-452: The president's core team. Medvedev's old classmate from his student years, Konstantin Chuichenko , became his personal assistant. Medvedev was reported to have taken care not to upset the balance of different factions in the presidential administration and in the government. However, the influence of the powerful security/military-related siloviki weakened after Medvedev's inauguration for
15151-424: The presidential administration of the government when Putin appointed him as first deputy prime minister of Russia. In particular, Medvedev was made responsible for the implementation of the National Priority Projects focusing on improving public health , education , housing and agriculture . The program saw an increase of wages in healthcare and education and construction of new apartments but its funding, 4% of
15290-475: The pronunciation of ultra-short or reduced /ŭ/ , /ĭ/ . Because of many technical restrictions in computing and also because of the unavailability of Cyrillic keyboards abroad, Russian is often transliterated using the Latin alphabet. For example, мороз ('frost') is transliterated moroz , and мышь ('mouse'), mysh or myš' . Once commonly used by the majority of those living outside Russia, transliteration
15429-466: The proper pronunciation of uncommon words or names. Russian is an East Slavic language of the wider Indo-European family . It is a descendant of Old East Slavic , a language used in Kievan Rus' , which was a loose conglomerate of East Slavic tribes from the late 9th to the mid-13th centuries. From the point of view of spoken language , its closest relatives are Ukrainian , Belarusian , and Rusyn ,
15568-772: The regulation (that the bank argued were wrongly applied) doesn't prevent the Court to from choosing one that fits best its general purposes. In February 2022, amid the Russo–Ukrainian crisis , US and EU officials were reportedly finalizing an extensive package of sanctions on VTB bank and other related Russian entities. On 24 February, after Russia launched a full-scale invasion of Ukraine, US president Joe Biden and British prime minister Boris Johnson announced new sanctions against VTB bank along with other Russian individuals and companies. [REDACTED] Media related to VTB Bank at Wikimedia Commons Russian language Russian
15707-491: The respondents), while according to the 2002 census – 142.6 million people (99.2% of the respondents). In Ukraine , Russian is a significant minority language. According to estimates from Demoskop Weekly, in 2004 there were 14,400,000 native speakers of Russian in the country, and 29 million active speakers. 65% of the population was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 38% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. On 5 September 2017, Ukraine's Parliament passed
15846-518: The rest of the government on 15 January 2020 to allow Putin to make sweeping constitutional changes and was succeeded by Mikhail Mishustin on 16 January 2020. Putin appointed Medvedev the same day to the new office of deputy chairman of the Security Council. To some analysts, Medvedev's presidency seemed to promise positive changes both at home and in ties with the West, signaling "the possibility of
15985-461: The results were falsified by the election committees. However, after the correction for the alleged falsification factor, Medvedev still came out as the winner although with 63% of the vote instead of 70%. On 7 May 2008, Dmitry Medvedev took an oath as the third president of the Russian Federation in a ceremony held in the Grand Kremlin Palace . After taking the oath of office and receiving
16124-405: The school's final exams in 1982 a "tough period when I had to mobilize my abilities to the utmost for the first time in my life." In the autumn of 1982, 17-year-old Medvedev enrolled at Leningrad State University to study law. Although he also considered studying linguistics , Medvedev later said he never regretted his choice, finding his chosen subject increasingly fascinating, stating that he
16263-541: The second time in June 2002, a position which he held until his ascension to presidency in 2008. During Medvedev's tenure, Gazprom's debts were restructured and the company's market capitalisation grew from $ 7.8 billion in 2000 to $ 300 billion in early 2008. Medvedev headed Russia's negotiations with Ukraine and Belarus during gas price disputes. In October 2003, Medvedev replaced Alexander Voloshin as presidential chief of staff . In November 2005, Medvedev moved from
16402-675: The survey carried out by RATING in August 2023 in the territory controlled by Ukraine and among the refugees, almost 60% of the polled usually speak Ukrainian at home, about 30% – Ukrainian and Russian, only 9% – Russian. Since March 2022, the use of Russian in everyday life has been noticeably decreasing. For 82% of respondents, Ukrainian is their mother tongue, and for 16%, Russian is their mother tongue. IDPs and refugees living abroad are more likely to use both languages for communication or speak Russian. Nevertheless, more than 70% of IDPs and refugees consider Ukrainian to be their native language. In
16541-508: The syntax of Russian dialects." After 1917, Marxist linguists had no interest in the multiplicity of peasant dialects and regarded their language as a relic of the rapidly disappearing past that was not worthy of scholarly attention. Nakhimovsky quotes the Soviet academicians A.M Ivanov and L.P Yakubinsky, writing in 1930: The language of peasants has a motley diversity inherited from feudalism. On its way to becoming proletariat peasantry brings to
16680-699: The title sponsor of the VTB United League since 2008. Since 2005, VTB Bank has been the general sponsor of the Kamaz Master team, a team which has been active in re-known rally raid such as Dakar Rally , Silk Way Rally and Africa Eco Race . Since 2013, VTB Group has been supporting the Velobike , a bicycle-sharing system in Moscow , a project by the Department for Transport and Development of Road Infrastructure of
16819-770: The two. Others divide the language into three groupings, Northern , Central (or Middle), and Southern , with Moscow lying in the Central region. The Northern Russian dialects and those spoken along the Volga River typically pronounce unstressed /o/ clearly, a phenomenon called okanye ( оканье ). Besides the absence of vowel reduction, some dialects have high or diphthongal /e⁓i̯ɛ/ in place of Proto-Slavic * ě and /o⁓u̯ɔ/ in stressed closed syllables (as in Ukrainian) instead of Standard Russian /e/ and /o/ , respectively. Another Northern dialectal morphological feature
16958-506: The use of the language has some presence in certain areas. A large part of the population, especially the older generations, can speak Russian as a foreign language. However, English has replaced Russian as lingua franca in Lithuania and around 80% of young people speak English as their first foreign language. In contrast to the other two Baltic states, Lithuania has a relatively small Russian-speaking minority (5.0% as of 2008). According to
17097-453: The work and the responsibility calling it "a test of strength". As president, Putin launched a campaign against corrupt oligarchs and economic mismanagement. He appointed Medvedev chairman of gas company Gazprom 's board of directors in 2000 with Alexei Miller . Medvedev put an end to the large-scale tax evasion and asset stripping by the previous corrupt management. Medvedev then served as deputy chair from 2001 to 2002, becoming chair for
17236-633: The world's ninth-most spoken language by total number of speakers . Russian is one of two official languages aboard the International Space Station , one of the six official languages of the United Nations , as well as the fourth most widely used language on the Internet . Russian is written using the Russian alphabet of the Cyrillic script ; it distinguishes between consonant phonemes with palatal secondary articulation and those without—the so-called "soft" and "hard" sounds. Almost every consonant has
17375-405: Was a popular teacher: "strict but not harsh". During his tenure Medvedev co-wrote a popular three-volume civil law textbook which over the years has sold a million copies. Medvedev also worked at a small law consultancy firm which he had founded with his friends Anton Ivanov and Ilya Yeliseyev, to supplement his academic salary. In 1990, Anatoly Sobchak returned from Moscow to become chairman of
17514-560: Was born on 14 September 1965 in Leningrad , in the Soviet Union. His father, Anatoly Afanasyevich Medvedev (November 1926 – 2004), was a chemical engineer teaching at the Leningrad State Institute of Technology . Dmitry's mother, Yulia Veniaminovna Medvedeva (née Shaposhnikova, born 21 November 1939), studied languages at Voronezh University and taught Russian at Herzen State Pedagogical University . Later, she would also work as
17653-494: Was broadly positive, not just among the supporters of the government, but across the political spectrum. Medvedev's popularity ratings soared by around 10 percentage points to over 70%, due to what was seen as his effective handling of the war. Shortly in the aftermath of the conflict, Medvedev formulated a 5-point strategy of the Russian foreign policy, which has become known as the Medvedev Doctrine . On 30 September 2009,
17792-520: Was brought into the Russian presidential administration . Three years later, on 16 August 1999, he became Prime Minister of Russia . Three months later, in November 1999, Medvedev became one of several from St. Petersburg brought in by Vladimir Putin to top government positions in Moscow. On 31 December, he was appointed deputy head of the presidential staff , becoming one of the politicians closest to future President Putin. On 17 January 2000, Dmitry Medvedev
17931-456: Was elected president in the 2008 election . He was seen as more liberal than his predecessor Vladimir Putin , who was prime minister in Medvedev's presidency . Medvedev's agenda as president was a wide-ranging modernisation programme , aimed at modernising Russia's economy and society, and lessening the country's reliance on oil and gas. During Medvedev's tenure, the United States and Russia signed
18070-405: Was first introduced in North America when Russian explorers voyaged into Alaska and claimed it for Russia during the 18th century. Although most Russian colonists left after the United States bought the land in 1867, a handful stayed and preserved the Russian language in this region to this day, although only a few elderly speakers of this unique dialect are left. In Nikolaevsk, Alaska , Russian
18209-421: Was fluent in Russian in 2006, and 19% used it as the main language with family, friends, or at work. According to the 2014 Moldovan census , Russians accounted for 4.1% of Moldova's population, 9.4% of the population declared Russian as their native language, and 14.5% said they usually spoke Russian. According to the 2010 census in Russia , Russian language skills were indicated by 138 million people (99.4% of
18348-537: Was lucky "to have chosen a field that genuinely interested him and that it was really 'his thing'". Fellow students described Medvedev as a correct and diplomatic person who in debates presented his arguments firmly, without offending. During his student years, Medvedev was a fan of the English rock bands Black Sabbath , Led Zeppelin , and Deep Purple . He was also fond of sports and participated in athletic competitions in rowing and weightlifting . He graduated from
18487-458: Was promoted to 1st class Active State Councillor of the Russian Federation (the highest federal state civilian service rank ) by the Decree signed by Vladimir Putin as acting President of Russia . During the 2000 presidential elections , he was Putin's campaign manager . Putin won the election with 52.94% of the popular vote. Medvedev was quoted after the election commenting he thoroughly enjoyed
18626-554: Was reorganised as Bank VTB North-West and later became VTB's North-Western Regional Centre, and bought the Ukrainian bank Mriya, which was later merged with VTB Bank (Ukraine). In 2007, the bank set up a subsidiary in Angola known as VTB África. The bank also took over Slavneftebank in Belarus and later renamed it VTB Belarus. In June, VTB became the first Russian bank to offer an initial public offering (IPO), raising $ 8 billion in what became
18765-560: Was signed between the bank president, Director of Russian Post , Dmitry Strashnov, and Minister of Communications and Mass Media , Nikolai Nikiforov , on the Russian Post purchase of 50 percent minus 1 share of Leto Bank (Summer Bank) from VTB24, with the purpose of reorganising it into the National Post Bank . The remaining 50 percent plus one share will be owned by VTB24 of VTB Bank. VTB CEO Kostin suggested appointing Dmitry Rudenko,
18904-462: Was signed between the warring parties. On 26 August, after being unanimously passed by the State Duma , Medvedev signed a decree recognising South Ossetia and Abkhazia as independent states. The five-day conflict cost the lives of 48 Russian soldiers, including 10 peacekeepers, while the casualties for Georgia was 170 soldiers and 14 policemen. The Russian popular opinion of the military intervention
19043-464: Was staged on TV with four parties suggesting Medvedev's candidature to Putin, and Putin then giving his endorsement. The four pro-Kremlin parties were United Russia , Fair Russia , Agrarian Party of Russia and Civilian Power . United Russia held its party congress on 17 December 2007 where by secret ballot of the delegates, Medvedev was officially endorsed as their candidate in the 2008 presidential election. He formally registered his candidacy with
19182-402: Was the sixth-most used language on the top 1,000 sites, behind English, Chinese, French, German, and Japanese. Despite leveling after 1900, especially in matters of vocabulary and phonetics, a number of dialects still exist in Russia. Some linguists divide the dialects of Russian into two primary regional groupings, "Northern" and "Southern", with Moscow lying on the zone of transition between
19321-483: Was too liberal and too pro-Western for Putin to endorse him as a candidate. Instead, Western observers expected the candidate to arise from the ranks of the so-called siloviki , security and military officials many of whom were appointed to high positions during Putin's presidency. The silovik Sergei Ivanov and the administrator-specialist Viktor Zubkov were seen as the strongest candidates. In opinion polls asking Russians to pick their favourite successor to Putin from
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