clear, that way you cut this -- now, deadly umbilical cord between the soch rvereign and t banks. necessary condition for survival. little fiscal europe. but no cross board distribution. the notion that simply because the portugal is much poorer than say whatever, than sweden, you are going to have equalizing transfers. it doesn't play within europe anymore. the willingness s -- willingness to engage is vanishing fast. more englishmen. there are rich catalonia no longer wishes to give its largess to andalucia. in, in italy, it is believed

that, italy stops, not too far south of rome. and it wants to end the transfer. the notion that you are going to have a transfer europe is, politically impossible. you are going to have an insurance europe. that should be good enough. hopefully prevent tich oive eur. >> probably a good place to stop. doctor, thank you so much. >> you are welcome.

on friday, saturday, president obamawell cups world leaders from the largest economies to the g-8 conference at camp dach it vid in maryland. and the u.s. hosts nato head of states in chicago. next a preview of the g-8 summit and u.s./russia relations. former u.s. ambassador to nato, nicholas ferns taulks about the future of nato. >> when people are saying to him -- don't take the vice presidency. right now you are a powerful majority leader.

don't take the vice presidency. you won't hatch any powve any p. johnson says power is where power goes. meaning i can make power in any situation. his whole life. nothing in his life previously makes that seem like he is boasting. because that's exactly what he had done. all his life. >> sunday night, the conclusion of our conversation with robert caro on the passage of power, volume four the years of lyndon johnson. sunday night on cspan's, q and a. >> the center for strategic and international studies hosted a forum last week on u.s./russia relations. panelists include the former u.s. ambassador to russia, and the current russian ambassador to the u.s. this comes ahead of the g-8 summit at camp dach vid this we.

>> welcome. i'm meredith, the chair in international business here at csis. on behalf of myself, and the director of our russian-eurasia program program. on the eve of the g-8 summit meeting and period leading up to the vote we hope next month in the russian state to ratify russia's succession to the wto, world trade organization. since 2009, the reset in relations between russia and the united states there, have been many successes, including the s.t.a.r.t. treaty, cooperation on afghanistan, iran, and north korea. civilian nuclear power, and other areas. but there have been notable differences over syria, missile defense, human rights, enforcement of intellectual

property rights and con dufkt elections last month. both president put spin and president obama have called for a deepening of economic cooperation between the two countries. the russian state duma its expected to ratify russia's succession to the wto in june or july. we expect 30 days after that, roughly, that russia will become a member of the world trade organization. for the united states, to take advantage of the new market openings in the russian market, congress must pass legislation to grant russia permanent normal trade relations treatment. the panel today will focus on prospects for improving relations with russia, and how the wto process has prompted russia to take measures to open its economy, to more international trade and investment. we had timed this panel so it could set the stage for the meeting between president obama and president putin, on may

18th. which we have just learned has been canceled today. president putin has decided to forego his trip to the united states for the g-8 summit meeting. we will hear more about that from our panelists. i would like to yield to my colleague, andrew crutch spins, director of the russia/eurasia program here at csis. he will moderate. >> thank you for the introduction. welcome everybody to csis. delighted to see a full room and such interest in u.s. slush russia relations and economic dimension. and we have an absolutely superb group of speakers. let me make haste and make some brief in troep dutroductions. we'll start off with our two -- ambassadors to each other's country. first of all current ambassador from the russian federation to my right, ser vagei ivanovich, g

severing, members of the min streep of forei -- min streistry of affairs. here since 2008. overseeing from the russian side, improvement in relations often called the reset. he has served as the russia's ambassador to brussels and ambassador to nato and deputy foreign minister. a wonderful pleasure to see you here at csis. our second speaker will be ambassador john buyerly, who just returned from a successful stint in moscow as our ambassador off to the russian federation. he arrived back in january of 2012. he from the american perspective was implementing on the ground the improvement of relations in, and the long series of agreements and cooperation that have developed over the past three years between the united

states and the russian federation. he is one of our longest severing and most successful decorated members of the, u.s. foreign service. he has also served as our ambassador to bulgaria. from 2005 to 2008. and many, many other assignments having to do with, with the soviet union, russian federation, east central europe and europe. john, great to see you here today. >> thanks. >> our third speaker to my left will be ambassador susan schwaab, served as united states trade representative for several years beginning in june of 2006. she is currently professor at school of public policy at university of marylandai pla, s a long history. you served as dean of the university of maryland school of public policy for eight years in '95 to '03. if you read in the biographical material, on ambassador schwaab.

you will see a long series of achievements she representing the united states and trade negotiations. own one i am not seeing, u.s./russia bilateral agreement in november 2006. senate is my oversight. our final speaker, batting clean-up today. will be, claus kleinfeld, ceo of alcoa, the largest, integrate a alum numb country. 61,000 employees in 31 countries. a big job. i want to extend a shout out to the business council. and their, president, ed varona, vice president, randy levinas, working for the coalition of u.s./russia trade and working on this effort to, to promote russia's graduation from the

jackson/vanek amendment and being granted permanent normal trade status. which we hope will happen sometime soon this year. so with that let me turn the floor over to the ambassador. sorry, the ambassador. my apologies. >> our guest of honor. >> i was trying to achieve a measurement of success.

[ inaudible ] for >> the amendment that was introduced way back in the cold war time. and following the disagreement. and with the united states, the immigration since then. we have progressed in our relations with israel significantly. it is a friendly country. and the visa with each other. russians go to israel. >> i think you probably have to switch the microphone on. >> and coming back, russian origin. coming back with ideas. with sometimes, money, technologies. to work in the country that they

know very well. and that is quite normal. i would say that we have -- normalcy in our relations with israel but we do not have normalcy, relation in the particular field with the united states over the issue that is no longer. by all standard. still there because there is a political context for this. and probably we will see, hear it a lot. debate to whether russia can graduate from jackson/vanek or not. in terms of russian economic interest, the condition of negotiations, offen tr entry, ie wto, give us an opportunity to become a member pretty soon befrp the e before the end of the year. if it is not granted to russia that means, kind of it isresip

r recip reciprocal. it means the benefits that the wto gives to foreign countries, entering russian market will be less available to american counterparts than to many others. we do not like that kind of situation. what we think is needed is normalcy in our relation. normalcy. it is something that is still missing. we try to measure our relations by agreements in arms control. one to three agreements that are extremely important in their own right. and what its missing? normal trade. interaction in business communities. not only big companies that have entered the market and are doing pretty well or, a number of russian companies that have invested heavily in the united

states, are doing pretty well. and i will give you a couple of examples. tmk is -- the biggest producer of tubes. in the world. they have become number one. having entered the american market as well. they're the best. they have invested in -- i think, four, or five, facility productions here. they are also interested in steel mills here. they are well-received where they operate in the united states. and we consider it to be a step toward the normalcy in our relations. i would also say that we are big market. you are the bigger market. we have market with 142 million people with the highest income, depends on how you qualify the countries with economy in transition or developing countries, but, russian market

its very, very significant for -- for all of the parties including those in the united states. the current numbers if you look into this -- are reflecting our trade. extremely modest. the last year, the trade both ways accounted for $40 billion. sound almost impressive. it is less than 1% of foreign trade of the united states. and less than 2 point something of russian foreign trade. which suggests in turn that neither united states nor russia are to each other an important economic partner. just for example with our neighbor in ukraine our trade is 20% higher. with eu it is -- it is almost ten times hyper.

-- ten times higher. so what it means, it means we are missing a good economic underpinning for political relations. and that leaves them still vulnerable to the politics of the day, to the crisises of the day, and, and unnecessarily so. we certainly have a lot of things that we have in common in terms of challenges that we face. and i, once drew a list of things that unite us. it appears much longer. we don't see eye to eye. and i would submit important for russia and hopefully for the united states. we have progress aid lot through the last three years. reset has brought a lot of new things, a lot of new way of doing things. the commission that was established by the two presidents seems to be producing new ideas, new avenues for, for

cooperation, both between the governments and also, creating framework for cooperation of nongovernmental operators. which its good. and we would look to see it progressing further. but still, the potential that does exist for, for our partnership is still intact. we want tight be developed in full. it benefits us and benefits you and our countries have a role in defining world stability and obtaining the world stability especially in the nuclear field and we are members of the security council. good relations between the two of us, usually translate into better ability on the international community and the focus on the international issues of the day. so, what i am -- trying to

suggest -- focusing on the subject matter of today's discussion, economics are important for the sake of economics. and in terms of building solid underpinning, political relations. making our relations less vulnerable for the differences, unavoidable. that they occur. even between the closest allies. but we have learned to work on the issue respectfully to each other. and it's, another achievement. but i think that -- that wto to us means better and more strong integration of markets. and american market. and partners in the field are the ones we would look to develop. stronger ties. and hopefully we will. thank you.

>> thank you very much, ambassador. i read vladamir putin's campaign article, february 27th, the one that dealt with foreign policy. and read the line, to the effect that -- that the trade and economic relationship between the united states and the russian federation is way underdeveloped. this is something we need to devote a lot more attention to. >> i agree. >> paraphrasing what you said and sound look a talking point right out of the state department. so let me transition to you, john buyerly. >> andy, thank you very much. thanks to csis for convening this very timely panel. as the the u.s. ambassador to russia for the past 3 1/2 years up until january of this year the i was often asked, what exactly is the reset about? and i don't think i could put it any better than my friend sergei put it. about a much more normal relationship between the united states and russia. a more constructive, and a more productive relationship.

i have worked most of my career in the state department and even before frying to help foster that more constructive and more productive approach. and i and i was very fortunate over the past threeafter years to be able to play a part in some of the successes that sergei and andy talked about. i recall early on when president obama first took office and reached out in a letter and a phone call in an early meeting, making clear for the united states the reset was not just about improving the tone of the relationship, which had gotten a bit scratchy, frankly, in the years before he took office. it was also about a substantive agenda which would fundamentally improve living standards and a lot of people in both countries.

and clearly the start treaty, the cooperation that the united states and russia achieved on afghanistan, in particular russia's support for american's supply of its forces in afghanistan, those are two signal accomplishments that i think signaled very early on that both countries were serious about getting back to business and recapturing cooperation which had atrophied. but probably the most difficult goal the two presidents set for themselves they set fairly early and that was wto. wto membership for russia did not depend on the united states alone. obviously it depended mostly on actions that russia itself needed to take. but president obama made very very clear in some of his early meetings with president medvedev

very early on that he was willing to go the extra mile, to work with the european allies, to work with the european allies, to work with the u.s. congress, to work with the u.s. business community to ensure that every one saw the b benefits of w it to ex session for russia. the fact that russia was the only country in the g-8 not in the wto seemed to president obama to be incomprehensible. and i remember clearly when the president obama and medvedev met in the summer of 2010 in the cabinet room and discussed the need to really get down to business and push this across the finish line in a very, very short time frame. the presidents turned to their advisors and said we're going to go to lunch now and we want you to come up with the plan that will make russian membership in

wto a reality after 18 years. i look out in the audience and i see some of the people here from i ustr, betsy hartford, who were intimately involved in every step of this. the president had a strong team on his side led by ambassador ron kirk, and president medvedev also had a strong team. it was clear to us that first de deputy premier shuvolov would have the main responsibility for the legislation that needed to be passed in a very short period of time. and also it was clear to us that both sides needed to work hard to solve the problem over chicken exports which had perennially bedeviled u.s./russia trade relations. to make a long story short, as we all know, in the fall of last year, russia was formally invited to join the wto.

the negotiations were concluded after many, many hours in which russia, the united states, our european allies all identified the benefits to the world economy, not just to our own economy, not just to russia's economy, but to the world economy of having russia as a member of the wto. this to me is the achievement i'm the most proud of playing a small part in because the dividends from that will continue to pay out for years and even decades to come. as sergei said and i couldn't agree with him more, the foundation for a sustainable productive relationship between the united states and russia is a strong economic relationship. when i was coming up through the state department, arms control was the center of gravity and sergei and i both labored in the trenches on arms control negotiations for many years and as he said it's still extremely important but now a strong

commercial relationship, trade and investment, increasing trade volumes between the two countries, will create stakeholders on both sides who understand the fundamental importance of this relationship to the world economy, to the world as a whole, and will continue to push forward, sustain the momentum of the reset and also build on that to reach new achievements in the years to come. thank you. >> thanks very much, john. you know, it is to vladimir putin's credit that i don't think the russians got serious about the wto until he became president back in 2000 and that leads me to turn to . you, susan, as you were directly involved in many of the negotiations for several years. what is your perspective on what this means for russia and for the wto? >> well, i must say this has gone on a very long time.

speaking as one who put in several years, and betsy and others who are in the audience who were involved in the bilateral negotiation, the bilateral agreement phase of this. for those of you not familiar with the ins and outs of the wto exsession process would know that there are two stages. one, and this by the way is a miserable, miserable process for any country trying to come into the wto. this is not easy for russia, it was not easy for vietnam or ukraine or any other country, china, when china came in. being a latecomer to the wto, you're expected to come in and in five or ten years, do what every other country that's a member of the wto got 50 years to do. so let's put it into some perspective here. i had the opportunity to

negotiate on these matters over an extended period of time, and in 2006, november of 2006 to be precise, managed to conclude the bilateral russia/u.s. agreement on russia's accession to the wto, which is part of the series of bilateral agreements russia concluded in evaporates of the multilateral deal that was concluded oorps last year that paved the pay for the situation where we are -- where we find ourselves today. the short version of my remarks is, one, russia is going it to become a member of the wto this year. two, whether the united states graduates russia from jackson vanik or not, and therefore, three, the sooner the united states can move ahead with our own process so that we can fully take advantage of the, of

russia's joining, becoming a member of the wto, the better. that's sort of the short version. the slightly longer version is that it's somewhat more complicated than all this, as we know with implications for the various actors and i would begin by offering principle kudos and congratulations to the u.s. business community which has been up on capitol hill day in and day out making the case why it is in the interest of the united states as well as russia for russia to join the wto. it is very much in the interest of u.s. goods, producers of manufactured goods, agricultural exporters, services exporters, for russia to join the w it to,

for russia to lower its barriers to trade, to have disciplines on its intellectual property protections, for there to be dispute resolution enforcement opportunities. for those of you familiar with a website known as global trade alerts, the g-20 members all said they weren't going to pose protectionist trade investment measures. two years out, gta measured -- was able to measure some 431 new protectionist trade and investment barriers that were imposed by g-20 members. of those 431, russia had imposed 85. of the g-20 members, only russia is not a member of the wto.