bush -- we will be back with lindsey graham, mike huckabee. they will all be there. we will be live both days. thank you for joining us today. we hope you join us tomorrow and every day for another edition of "washington journal." ♪ [captions copyright national cable satellite corp. 2015] [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] >> about two hours from now, the new hampshire republican party will kick off it is calling the first in the nation leadership summit. former texas governor rick perry, new jersey governor chris

christie jeb bush, and senator marco rubio are among the speakers this afternoon and evening. you will have a chance to respond with phone calls and social media starting at 2:00 p.m. eastern. a coverage starts at 12:15 eastern. president obama is hosting the time prime minister of the white house. the leaders will hold a news conference at 11:50 eastern this morning. you can watch that live on c-span2. coming up next, segment from today's washington journal on food safety. the u.s. house will devil in at 10:30 eastern for what is expected to be a brief pro forma session. host: the center for public integrity. chris young and erin quinn. thank you for being here. first-time guests, both of the. the topic is what the fda does and does not know about what is in our food.

they have written a piece at the center for public integrity about all of this. quite a lengthy piece so we are going to learn a lot in the next 45 minutes but i wanted to start with a photo from the piece. a tragic story. here's a boy named miles, he is 11 years old. he suffered a fatal allergic reaction after he ate basically a turkey burger. erin quinn, explained the story. what happened. guest: miles was an 11-year-old boy who lived in california. the story is about how he was eating a turkey burger. it has an ingredient in it called micro-protein which is a meat alternative. it is a food additive. he suffered an allergic reaction. he had had an allergic reaction and algae to -- an allergy to mold. his mother was unaware of what the ingredients were in the

turkey burger. she says it was mislabeled. he began to suffer an allergic reaction. he could not believe and eventually died of anaphylactic shock the day after he ate the burger. host: how did it actually happen, and the context of your piece and what we are talking about here -- food safety issues? guest: micro protein, the ingredient the family is saying led to their family's death -- their son's death is a food additive declared safe a couple years ago. it has been on the market a couple years. they did a declaration of safety to the food and drug administration. the fda okeayed it but did not issue approval because of the process. since the mother was unaware of what it is really made of.

host: broadened this out, what is the fda's responsibility? what are they responsible for? guest: most people assume the fda is making sure every food ingredient that goes into our food is safe. but the fact is that that is actually not true. the bottom line is that the fda often has no idea what ingredients food companies are adding to our foods. it is not that these companies are doing anything illegal. there is a loophole in a 57-year-old law that makes this possible. host: what does this mean for all of us? it means -- guest: it means we are short information about how safe our food supply is. there are an estimated 1000, that is conservative, 1000 ingredients in our food that the

public does not know exists and even the fda does not know exists. host: i put the phone numbers on the screen for our guests. chris young and erin quinn of the center for public integrity talking about food quality issues. they'll be happy to take your calls, questions and comments. i want to put some context out there. this is from their piece. "in the past five decades the number of food additives have skyrocketed from about 800 to more than 10,000. added to everything from date good and for serials to energy bars and -- baked goods and cereals to energy bars. the approval system has slowed to a crawl, manufacturers have turned to a to energy bars. the approval system loophole." explain what that is.

guest: basically a process for which food additives can make it to the market. that came about in 1958 when the first law was passed to regulate food additives. the last set up two paths to markets. a company wishing to market an ingredient could go through a full review process three fda the ingredient would be submitted to extensive testing and review for safety. at the end, the fda would hopefully issue a formal approval and stand behind that approval and say we recognize this as safe. with the generally recognized as safe path, that was set up by congress for companies to bring to market ingredients that were commonly used and obviously safe. it was meant for the fda to not be bogged down to approve things like olive oil or vinegar or table saw. companies today use that

loophole far more often than going through the food additive review process. they can determine something is generally recognized as safe on their own with their own scientists are hired scientists and consultants and make a declaration. and then decide whether or not to notify the fda about safety decision. the fda, they have a chance to agree with the company but they do not make a formal approval of anything. the fda does not really stand behind the company's decision. it is up to the company. host: chris young, tell us more. guest: what she was saying about the idea that the fda does not stand by these decisions starting in 1997 the fda proposed rules that basically laid out guidelines for industry on what they can do if they wanted to seek the fda's so-called approval. they are not actually approving or affirming the safety of the ingredient. a company can determine on their

own that their ingredients are safe, generally recognized as safe. once paid do that, whether they have an expert panel of consultants that confirm that and say that they are safe, they can go to market immediately. they can also decide to go to the fda and submit the review to the fda and say we want you to review it and the fda like erin said, they do not affirm that, they send what is called a no questions letter. that means they are not disagreeing with the company's determination that this is generally recognized as safe but the responsibility is still on the company to be responsible for the safety of that ingredient and for its use. host: before we get to calls, erin quinn this gras with system, who oversees that? is there any oversight over that

system if the companies can just hire their own scientists? guest: in the case of companies who hire their own scientists to declare something as safe, if they do not notify the fda there is no real oversight by any regulators because that determination is private with the company. if they do notify the fda the fda does ask tough questions about those and there is a little bit of oversight but there is no formal approval. host: has congress had anything to say? guest: there is at least one legislator who expressed frustration in a statement to us, basically saying that she is upset at the fda has not acted on recommendations that the government accountable the office -- government accountability office made five years ago in a report where they had knowledge and said that the fda is not doing enough to

ensure the safety of the food supply. largely because a lot of safety determinations are being made without ever getting to the fda and the fda even knowing the ingredients exist. host: let's get the viewers involved in the program. chris young and erin quinn from the center for public integrity. cliff from maryland. good morning. caller: thanks for taking my call. this is really interesting to me. not only food but the drugs the fda fails to test adequately. i was unaware of this loophole you are talking about but it makes sense to me. what i really want to talk about was a related subject, which was the human growth hormone that has been added to milk products in this country. there was a story on fox news sunday years ago there tried to be a story -- some years ago

there tried to be a story. the reporters were forced to rewrite the story 80 times before they were fired. they sued fox news over their story about human growth hormone in milk causing cancer. they want to court and sued fox news. it should have been an open and shut case, they lost their case. here is the job dropper. the judge ruled that not only fox news but no network news company or corporation is obligated to tell the public the truth. have a good day. host: any thoughts? guest: what he is getting at, people are really concerned nowadays about transparency. the issue with the gras system is important because consumers want to know what is in their food.

a lot of people think that is relatively little to ask. you see this a lot with issues around the debate of people wanting to have labeling for genetically modified organisms. it is an issue that is basically across the country, people want to know what is and a lot of people expect that. host: a tweet to that effect, erin quinn. "we do not know what we eat, drink or brief." -- or briefreathe." take us back to the young boy who bought a turkey burger at a basketball game in california. to the point of people knowing what is in their food, how could somebody like this find out what they are ingesting? sporting event, find out exactly what they are ingesting? guest: while all the ingredients must be on food labels, a lot of

the ingredients are so new to the consumers, they are completely unfamiliar. they might not really relies what that ingredient could be action composed of. i believe that that was what the issue was in that case. guest: and the company denies the claims that the -- the family makes in their lawsuit that was filed. the company says that, you know, that their ingredient is safe. and that the fda, back in 2002, had essentially agreed to that. host: let's hear from john in north port, florida. a republican. caller: good morning. my concerns are with the farmers -- a lot of the farmers i think to throughout the country, they are losing their farms because you know, with the natural gas industry, it is -- has really taken off today. some of the land is starting to get polluted. but my concern is that if the

farmers keep losing their farms in the united states and we depend on other sources of food from other countries, i think that is my biggest worry. just want to know how do you feel if we have to depend on other countries like we depend on oil, what is our future for the food? that is my question to you. what direction are we going to go? and how can we stop this? host: thank you for calling john. erin quinn? guest: that is an interesting point. as we looked at a lot of the notifications that the companies have made to the fda about the ingredients that they have declared the safe and want to bring to market, we took a look at all of the notifications that are available. and i goes back to 1998. we did see in our data that there are a lot more international companies that are getting involved in the market here, and bringing additives here for typically processed foods. they do have to go through the same exact processes as a

domestic company but it is definitely something that we noticed. guest: and just to expand on that a little bit more, a lot of these companies that are coming up with these ingredients are from all over the world. so what these companies also -- these are -- we are trying to get an understanding of what these companies are. these are often the companies that are supplying ingredients to the major companies that are household names. like general mills, kellogg's. the companies that are extra coming up with these ingredients aren't as much of a household name as the companies they are supplying them to. host: we have carol on the line from ohio. a democrat. hi, there. caller: yes, hello. my comment is -- i am a trout of the 1950's. i remember when food tasted like food. now you have food that is

basically plastics and just all kinds of -- it is just awful. children of today don't even have a clue as to what food real food tastes like. and it is very upsetting because her have chemicals that in other countries, yet we put it in our bread and baked products. potassium bromine, you have hydrolyzed soy protein msg. a lot of people are concerned about msg, so they mask that as soy protein. this is awful because the companies are profiting, and we are getting some of the worst things to put in our bodies that should be nutritious. what we need for a bodies to be healthy, yet people are so desensitized to the chemicals in the food.

if you stop eating a certain food and then you begin to eat it again, you actually taste the chemicals want to have desensitized your body to the horrible ingredients that are in our food. host: thanks for calling, carol. guest: she mentioned the expansion of the number of ingredients in our food. and that is something that was brought to our attention because when this law was passed, regulating food additives, there were only 800 food additives that were added to the food supply. today, consumer groups and others estimate that there are more than 10,000 ingredients that are added. so there has really been an expansion of processed foods lifestyle change, and so that's why these additives are making their way to the market. because they are typically found in the package goods. host: chris young, back to a tweet. how could anyone -- or how would anyone have known that this exact protein would react with a

specific mold allergy? guest: so, the family believes in their lawsuit that it should of been labeled as mold. as a mold-based ingredient. something that says mold. but there was nothing on the package that said that. the company doesn't think that that was required. that they shouldn't have to do that, but the family, in the lawsuit, says they would expect that to be on there because of your son, like theirs does, has an allergy to mold, then you can be able to identify that as a potentially harmful. host: dana calling now. hi, dana. caller: good morning, paula. and good morning to your guests. i haven't read the article yet but do the authors have a clue or any information about how many people have actually died or been injured from unknown food additives that have been

put into the food supply? secondarily, how would we even know whether -- what is being added because it is quote unquote not being required to states? whether that is humming us at all because unless you are like the young man who died from the anaphylactic shock, most of it would probably be long-term effects. i will drop off line and listen to the answer. thank you. host: thanks. guest: he is absolutely right that a lot of the additives -- the concerns would probably be more with long-term things. however, he did bring up what immediate effects they might be. and we did see that in the case of caffeinated alcoholic beverages. that was something that the fda expressed their concerns about as energy drink companies started to put a call in their beds rigid -- to put alcohol in their beverages.

there were college students who drink too much of them and end up in hospitals. there was a kiss we read about where appointed and updike because of events that transpired after drinking those types of beverages. but he does bring up a good point, which is that the biggest concerns that critics have with the system are that these food additives could have long-term effects that we just don't know about because nobody can really track the data. to see how consumption of these things are affecting people. guest: nobody can ask a find out that one thing companies are supposed to do when they are coming out and making their safety determinations if the commitment of that people having two ingredients. and when these companies are making these determinations in secret there is no way of being able to calculate the relative exposures. so let's take an example of -- imagine you are at your breakfast table. and you are -- a company has

determined that a particular ingredient is safe for a certain dose to use in a muffin. and they did that determination and secret -- in secret and never told the fda. another company made a similar determination on the same ingredient for breakfast cereals. at a certain company did the same for the same ingredient in juices. each of those companies might have made that determination that these are safe for that specific use, that they determined, but they have no idea what these other companies are doing. so even some of the industry consultants said, we do have concerns about that. the fact that we don't know what other companies are doing makes it hard for us to track this overtime. host: you have in your piece this section titled, it isn't the wild west. the fda has publicly acknowledged the shortcomings, you're right, but recently do

not have the information developed for the safety of many of these chemicals. meanwhile, industry scientists and lawyers contend that safety concerns are overblown. and government oversight would cripple the depleted fda and stifle innovation. quote, it isn't the wild west out there. we have the safest food supply in the world, but it gets to the point about fda resources. remind us of how the fda is structured right now. how big is it? what can of resources when they have? guest: sure. the fda regulates 80% of the nation's food supply. but they do have pretty tight resources right now, as has been told to us by consumer groups and even the fda itself. when the fda is deciding where to devote their resources, they are going to focus on more pressing issues like food borne

illness or contaminants in food like a listeria outbreak. something that they have to deal with immediately. and things like this that are much more long-term problems sort of take a backseat to that because they are focused on what is happening now. host: so there is a tweet out there that says, how are you going to test every food? is it even reasonable to think that that could happen? guest: that is one argument that the industry makes in support of the way the system works right now. they basically say that the fda this not -- if -- if it was required that all these companies go to the fda for a full review, we would have no new food additives. that basically the system would be stalled so much that we -- that food innovation would just not happen. we would be without a lot of these ingredients. a lot of critics of the system say, you know, why don't we completely ensure these ingredients are safe?

and we really need all of these ingredients? host: a democrat from riverside california. hi, there. caller: hi, i wanted to bring up a few things. -- is in a lot of things. it is a preservative. it can cause cancer. and when it is mixed with citric acid, and a lot of sodas popular want, it can cause leukemia. and the phosphoric acid, it is like a negative. so it oil and high fructose corn syrup, which was in a lot of things i haven't look at in my kitchen are on the top of the harmful foods. then i happened to get into some of my cosmetics. i found out that some of the ingredients in sunblock kenexa cause damage to your cells. -- can actually cause damage to

your cells. body lotions and things like that all have chemicals that you absorb. and on the generic medications 80% of them don't have to be tested. if the original project -- the original project -- product doesn't have to be tested. one last thing the -- suicide. due to have any depressant -- somebody is being paid off obviously. host: there is a lot there from gloria. any response to what you heard? guest: sure. there are advocacy groups that are working to promote right to know. the center for science and public interest to a good job of tracking what food additives they have concerns about and what products you can find them in. and there is a few substances

that chris and i took a look at that these groups have pointed out are considered carcinogens that other government agencies like the nest new -- the national institute of health those do sometimes make it into our food. guest: and in interesting point about lawsuit. the one point that industry consultants we talked to said over and over again said, why would they add ingredients to our food if they knew they were unsafe? because these companies would open themselves up to a slew of lawsuits. but the counter argument to that is that it is hard for people to be able to point to a specific ingredient and say this caused me harm and, therefore, i am going to sue. as you know and the viewers know, a lot of these ingredient labels have sometimes dozens of

ingredients on them. to be able to point out a specific one is really hard, especially if these ingredients -- we don't even know about. host: an independent color named joe. joe, you are on with chris young and erin quinn. caller: hello? host: hi, joe. joe, are you there? caller: my question is -- with all these ingredients they are putting in here, then you come up with this graph, and the government basically approves whatever they want to put in there. why do we even need the fda teco why don't we shut it down and save a couple hundred billion dollars? if the companies can do whatever they want to the food, we don't need the fda anymore. host: perspective from joe there and fda. guest: companies will say that

they ensure the safety of their food and they are very careful about all their testing. they make sure they cover all their bases before they put something in the food. and that may be true. they may do all of that work but consumer groups and other critics of the system say, if there is no agency that is overseeing everything and can say for certain this is everything in our food, there is no way to track how humans are consuming that and what types of long-term effects there could be after people consume that over long periods of time. host: chris young, you have a section in the piece about trans fats. guest: trans fats is an example of an ingredient that we have known -- that public health officials have known for a long time as being harmful. and causing a variety of health issues for people. obviously, trans fats have been used in processed foods for

years now. and the fda has been aware of this for a long time, but it is only now considering acting and banning trans fats. we are taking it off of the so-called grass list, the generally recognized safe to list. the latest on that is that a couple of years ago, they made a tentative ruling that they were going to ban trans fats, or take it off the list. and now, the expectation is that this summer, that is when it might happen. host: erin quinn, let me ask you about this piece from the center. food safety scientist have big ties to tobacco. guest: so, the scientists are typically the ones that are hired to be on the panel that these companies can be in order to declare something is safe. these panels are very important to the decisions on safety. they review all of the

>> you can watch this and all of our "washington journal" segments online at cspan.org. we are leaving the last few minutes of the discussion to go to the floor of the house for what is expected to be a brief pro forma session this friday. [captioning made possible by the national captioning institute, inc., in cooperation with the united states house of reprentis. any use of the closed-captioned coverage of the house proceedings for political or commercial rpess expresslpribedy e u.s. hse of representatives.] the speaker pro tempore: the house will be in order.

the chair lays before the house a communication from the speaker. the clerk: the speaker's rooms, washington, d.c. april 17 2015. i hereby had appoint the honorable charles w. boustany to act as speaker pro temporerary on this day. signed john a. boehner, speaker of the house of representatives. the speaker pro tempore: the prayer will be offered by our chaplain, father conroy. chaplain conroy: let us pray. eternal god, we give you thanks for giving us another day. send your spirit of peace, honesty and fairness during this long weekend of constituent visits. may the years and -- ears and hearts of all the members of congress be open to listen to the hopes and needs of those whom they represent. bless the people of this great nation with wisdom, knowledge and understanding that they might responsibly participate in our american democracy.

please keep all who work for the people's house in good health, that they might faithfully fulfill a great responsibility given them in their service to the work of the capitol. bless thus day and every day -- us this day and every day and may all that is done here this day be for your greater honor and glory, amen. the speaker pro tempore: the chair has examined the journal of the last day's proceedings and announces to the house hi pralheof pursuantolause 1 oru 1 the journal stands approved. the chair will lead the house now in the pledge of allegiance. please stand and join in the pledge. i pledge allegiance to the flag of the united states of america and to the republic for which it stands, one nation, under god, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. being that there are no communications or messages for the house today, without

objection, the house standsmike lillis, congressional reporter for "the hill." guest: good morning. host: why don't you pick up where we left off on the human trafficking bill. it came to an abrupt in the senate. what is the bill about and where is it now? guest: it came to an abrupt end. the plan to go yesterday was canceled. a lot of people think that is good and means there are talks

going on behind closed doors that are making progress. i think it is a postponement and we are likely to see it come up next week. mitch mcconnell said last night he is hopeful that they can do that make some progress over the weekend and iron out the sticking points. it's a bill sponsored by john cornyn, a texas republican. it creates a fund based on criminal fines that benefits victims of human trafficking. it's not a controversial concept. it passed easily through the house. when it got to the senate the republicans attached some abortion language to it, antiabortion language. saying that none of the funds could be used for abortion services. it was funny, democrats said they had not seen that provision when they passed it through the committee. when they got to the floor they said this is an expansion of the existing federal ban on federal funding for abortion services and we are not going to qualify it -- to codify. get it out of there or we will

not pass it on the floor. that is where we have been to the last six weeks. host: take us to iran. we have been hearing from senator corker about the bipartisanship in the market. when is the iran legislation coming to the senate floor and remind us about what it does. guest: the timing is going to depend on the human trafficking bill. the republicans want to pass that first and they are holding up the nomination of loretta lynch for attorney general based on the human trafficking bill. then the iran language would come third in that sequence. it's a, congress has always wanted to have a louder voice in these negotiations. negotiations with iran have been going on for years. as we got to the endit's a, congress has always and it looks like they were going to cut a deal there were a lot of lawmakers in both houses and parties who wanted to take a

look at it. there was concerns especially the government in israel, they say this is the first steps to an arms race and they think this will not do enough to prevent iran from getting a nuclear weapon. congress says we need to have a say. the initial bill was sponsored by bob corker a before and relations committee. democrats were balking at that, especially house democrats. looked like they might be able to sustain a veto that was promised by obama. so they tweaked it and now it is a bipartisan, more bipartisan bill. the timing on it is going to depend on what happens in the senate next week. you look for that to come to the floor before the end of the month. host: speaking of timing, harry reid is not a happy person right now regarding loretta lynch. here is a tweet he sent, "i want everyone to know that loretta

lynch's nomination will not remain in purgatory for effort." he says he will try to force a vote. what might he try to do and when? guest: he is the minority but there are procedural steps he can take. they are rarely used but he can try to force a vote, which would put, he thinks, republicans in a tough spot politically. loretta lynch is not a controversial figure. she is expected to pass through the chamber pretty quickly once she gets there. she would be the first african-american woman to hold the post. there are political considerations there. harry reid thinks it would put republicans in a tough spot if he forced the vote. what happened yesterday and it sounds like the talks are progressing behind closed doors. you heard a number of people on both sides of the aisle, debbie s stepanabenow has been

pushing for this. she says there is a possibility of reaching an agreement of the weekend. harry reid is pressing but i think he will back off, he does this a lot. it is a two-track debate things going on behind closed doors and that is where progress is happening and then there is politicking on the chamber floor and in the media and that is where the leaders get involved in all the threat come up. i think that is a sign that things might actually get done. host: on the house side, what message did the house send this week? what market regarding all the tax bills. here's a headline about the estate tax. what do they actually accomplish here? guest: these are very partisan bills. i misunderstood your question. this is nothing new.

the estate tax is something the republicans have been pushing for for many years. it is a partisan bill, almost along party lines. it will not go anywhere, it probably will not pass the senate and obama would certainly be doubted. -- certainly veto it. these are messages about budget and the economy and all kinds of things setting the stage for 2016 and the presidential election. nothing new there and nothing really to see. it is just and messaging bill. it will die. host: before we let you know, i've got to ask you about the pilot of the gyrocopter. this headline in "the new york times" says there is a mix of curiosity and outrage over what happened at the capitol. what is the fallout? guest: it had yet to be seen. it was funny yesterday, we were asking everybody and everybody is just kind of scratching their head.

the question we heard over and over is how could this happen? 14 years after 9/11, this is restricted airspace. how could a guy fly in for a couple hours and land on the capitol grounds? nobody had a good answer. jeh johnson the secretary of homeland security, said, he suggested the guy literally was flying so low he was under the radar and they did not detect him. they did not have the technology to see a guy coming back low. even though he had forecasted was coming and the press new he was coming. the press did not seem to. so many -- the police did not seem to. so many agencies involved, secret service, capitol police, faa, d.c. police, they will do an investigation. i do not think you will see congress do anything until that happens. they want to see the details like everybody else. the question is how did it happen and how can we prevent it from happening again? there is fear. host: mike liles, congressional

reporter from&." thank you for your >> during this month, c-span is pleased to present the winners of the student cam documentary competition, which allows students to think critically about issues that affect the nation. students were asked to create documentaries based on the theme "the three branches and you." demonstrating how a policy, law or action by the government has affected them or their community. allie stanley and katherine thompson from fort payne middle school in fort payne alabama are one of our second prize winners. they focused on the tennessee valley authority act of 1933. >> over 80 years ago, the tennessee valley was exposed to electricity.

it became a booming economy. but why? what could change the economic climate so quickly? >> the idea seemed impossible but the impossible became the reality. it was one of the most successful government projects. the tennessee valley authority act. >> the president was franklin delano roosevelt. he had a vision to improve the quality of life in the tennessee valley region. he created what was to become the tennessee valley authority. >> this was the plan, to have a -- to chain the river through a series of giant dams opening the river to navigation from beginning to end, to give farmers the benefit of modern

science and help them control the water on their land. this will exploit the mineral resources of the area. the dams would also reinforce millions of acres. the plan was to use the electric power generated by the dam to develop industry in the cities. it was going to electrify farms throughout the rural areas. and above all, improve daily life in the tennessee valley. >> president roosevelt signed the tennessee valley authority act on may 18, 1933. >> it's interesting to think back about what it's like without electricity. it's changed everything. just like the automobile changed everything. >> my husband says he and his little brother david watched the toaster.

and put the toaster down and waited anxiously for the test to pop -- toast to pop up. >> our main headquarters are in knoxville. we have a large office complex in chattanooga tennessee, and in huntsville, nashville tennessee. we are spread out through a seven state region. >> the agency runs the largest -- fifth largest river system to reduce flood damage and protect water quality. >> millions of people enjoy recreational activities on lakes created by the tva. there are 80 public recreation areas throughout the tennessee valley. >> tva owns and operates, but it's really the people's property. the people of the tennessee

valley and the united states have hundreds of thousands of acres that one can recreate. >> this is one of the 29 hydroelectric dams that produce electricity through the tennessee valley authority. >> hydroelectric power is generated using the force of falling water. water is held behind a dam. when electricity is needed, some of the water in the reservoir is released. gravity causes the water to fall through a pipe. the falling water spins a turbine attached to a waterwheel that turns energy into mechanical power, located at the end. what a turbine spins, it goes up to an electrical generator. as the shaft turns, it produces electricity. after flowing through the pin

stop and across the turbine the , water continues into the river on the other side of the dam. tva owns and operates one of the largest and most reliable transmission systems in north america. residence inn an 80,000-square mile area. >> my experience is that tva was a godsend to the people of the south. they dammed up water. it covered my ancestors' cemetery. it covered the farms. tva, or the tennessee valley authority, made the south come

alive. >> it can be summed up in three phrases -- keep the lights going, keep the lights glowing the economy going, and the river flowing. >> tva has renewed its vision to help lead the region to a cleaner and more secure energy future. >> everything we do is centered around trying to improve the quality of life for the people of the tennessee valley. we've been doing that for 81 years. that is our focus today. >> life in the valley would not be the same without it. -- without the vision of fdr. the tva act has drastically improved life in the valley. >> our community would not be the same without it. the tennessee valley authority has been one of the greatest federal project that has benefited the people of our country. >> to watch all of the winning

videos and learn more about our competition, go to cspan.org and click on "studentcam." also, tell us what you think about the issue these students addressed in their documentary on facebook and twitter. >> yesterday before a live studio audience, russian president vladimir putin answered questions on american and foreign policy on his annual call-in program. over 2 million questions were submitted via call, text, and e-mail. the entire event lasted more than four hours. during this portion putin , addressed relations with ukraine and the west, as well as the recent nuclear iran agreement. he said that it was highly unlikely that sanctions would be lifted because the talks were politicized. this is courtesy of u.s. english news channel russia today. >> we are watching the russian president right now, getting ready for his annual q&a address. over 2 million questions already posed to the russian president.

he set records in the past by going on for more than four hours before. as the russian president gets ready for his annual q&a address live, i will step aside and let the russian president man the helm from here. >> hello, mr. president, our call center has been working for a week, and of course we will keep taking your calls and questions. right now, our operators are prepared for a peak load of questions. you can call 8-800-600-4040 or send the text from abroad. use the number you see on the screen right now. during the last seven days, we have set a record. as of now, we have received more questions than last year by the time the show was over. we have a total of 2,486,000

calls and text messages. this year, we had an interesting novelty. you can send your mms, photo question to the president, demonstrating your problem instead of describing it in so many words. we also take video questions. you can upload them through the moscow ru website. again, we have sign language translation available. we will keep taking your questions until the end of the show. send your questions in, maybe the president will answer your question. here in the studio we have people of different professions, from different segments of russian society -- teachers, agricultural workers, rescue workers, military officers. they all have their questions.

shall we start? good morning. mr. putin, this year you had to face a lot of challenges. this was a time for you to make executive decisions. you are the only person capable of doing that. you had to take countersanctions, you had the situation with crimea, difficult economic situations, outside pressure, and you had to personally get involved to these matters. what is the outcome of this year? can you give us a list of successes and failures? president putin: that is a traditional question. i knew it would be coming, and i have to give you the results of the year. i jotted down some of the figures for myself. just to give you some fresh data, happy to share them with

you and the whole country. you mentioned some of the results, we now have the reunification with crimea. sevastopol. we also worked on the difficult geopolitical conditions. it was last year when we had the sochi olympic games. it was a very successful sports event. that was what happened last year. also, we faced restrictive measures by our foreign partners and it had an impact on our pace of growth. but as you see, the ruble has been strengthening. the stock exchange is growing, inflation has stayed within certain limits.

if you take last year, it grew by 0.6%. slight growth, but still, the economy is growing. manufacturing has been up for us. the output is 1.7%. processing is 2.1%. oil production has been at a record high. it is 525 million tons. russia saw one of the biggest harvests in its industry. 1.5 million tons. agriculture has been growing. 3.7% growth. this year, first quarter has demonstrated some good results. we also have good figures across other categories.

petrochemicals, 4.1%. fertilizers, 4.2%. sure, we do have problems, and the capex has been down, and also, direct investment down 2.5%. but we still have good results in housing construction. i would like to highlight the record amount of construction. again, russia has never seen such figures. even the soviet union wasn't able to match the figures. 81, or even 82 million square meters. these are stunning figures.

also, unemployment was up. it was 5.3% in 2014, now it is 5.8%. but still, we kept the growth of unemployment at a certain limit. inflation in the consumer sector was 11.4%. it is not good. of course it has a living standard on our people. inflation was down threefold. as for real income of the people, down 1%, while wages grew 1.3%. as you know, we have indexed pensions. we adjusted them to inflation. but still, there is a lot of economic uncertainty. there has been a lot of capital outflow, we have to bear that in mind.

of course, if there are further questions on the issue, i will be happy to take them and reply in more detail. but it is not a disaster. despite fluctuations in the stock market, banking sector in 2014 demonstrating good growth. retail loans were up. and assets of the russian banking system grew by 17 trillion rubles. for the first time they have a bypassed the gdp of the country. that is a good sign that the russian banking system has been very stable. it is great that both legal entities and now the individuals take their currency that they have purchased.

the number of deposits has grown 9.4%. we see that the amount of deposits is still growing. this year it is 19.5 trillion rubles. legal entities now have 26 trillion rubles in the deposits in russian banks. now, moving on to the budget. we have a 0.5% deficit. but nevertheless, it is still not very much. so i think we will stay within 3.7% at the maximum. one of the positive results of

2014 was the positive demographic trends. the birth rate was up, and mortality was down. life expectancy has been growing across russian regions. this is a very good sign. it means we have the upward trend and the sentiment of the people. that is the overview of 2014. host: mr. president, most of the figures have been macroeconomic indicators. they look quite positive but if we talk about the common person's experience, judging by the questions we have received and are still receiving on the hotline, it does not look as rosy. there is a great number of problems. let us talk about economics first. let us start with economic issues. i would like to start with the question that came after a recent article in a certain periodical.

a person who was present at a meeting with businessmen said that sanctions would not be lifted anytime soon. first of all, did you actually say that? and if yes, what do you think of the situation? president putin: you did not listen carefully to what i said. you have missed some things i said. i said there were positive things. i talked about macroeconomic factors, critical importance for our growth. but i also said that income has shrunk. that was due to inflation, 11.4%. i mentioned that. that's the sanctions. indeed, we had our meeting with

interpreters. i said it was highly unlikely sanctions would be lifted anytime soon. it is a politicized issue. some of our partners -- it has a strategic character. they want to restrain our growth. i don't think it has any relation to the conflict in ukraine. we are doing everything we can to implement the minsk agreements, but our partners have not caught up. the most important thing for us is to use more sophisticated ways of management. and of course, a lot depends on us domestically. we just mentioned inflation, we

mentioned real wages. what is the reason for the decline? of course, there is a lot of pressure on the ruble. the ruble has depreciated. it depends on oil prices. it is well-known that unfortunately we have this economy that is too dependent on oil. it is difficult to change the situation. but over the past years, we saw real wages growing at a higher pace than productivity gains. this is something very important. regardless of any sanctions, an adjustment was imminent. the central bank and the government took those sanctions as a helping hand, so to speak.

they could have said, ok, these were the measures we need for adjustment, and it happened because of the sanctions. that adjustment took place. it is important, and the markets have responded to that. it means our economy is getting healthier. it means we have the basic conditions for growth. of course, sanctions have an impact. we will talk further about that in questions. but it is not the most important thing. host: still, is it possible that the situation in russia will be similar to that in iran with decades of sanctions? president putin: russia is not iran. the russian economy is much bigger and more diversified than the iranian economy.

we do not have the same policy in terms of energy that iran is conducting. we have the energy sector which is much more market-based. it is not a good comparison. in terms of how long we should wait for the sanctions to be lifted, i would like to rephrase the questions. we have to take advantage of the situation to reach new levels of development. look at import substitution, we are now forced to implement measures. we have high-tech industries in our economy and we will achieve development faster then we projected earlier. look at agriculture, especially

after joining wto. we have made this sector healthier. sure, the groceries are more expensive. we have to wait for sometime. you just have to be patient. the output of the agriculture sector will surely happen. i know that agricultural producers are not very happy about the situation. the government still provides support. and of course, we make sure that we have agricultural and food safety. host: what about the food embargo? we did implement them because of sanctions. host: russia is a strong nation, and we can tolerate a lot of things, but many farmers say that they do not leave sanctions

as we are currently developing our own production, and it would be a real disaster. we can talk about this later. people talk about your big press conference six months ago. you said it will take two years to rebuild the economy. would you adjust your forecast? president putin: we see that the ruble is strengthening, the stock market is growing. a number of other sectors have been growing. i think it will take about two years, maybe faster. this year, the output will be down given all the factors internal and external. even at the beginning of the year, we projected that the outputs will be significantly down. this has not happened. according to the latest data, if we take march data year to year,

the output is 99% of all we had last march. so the production has been stable. of course, it depends on the interest rates, it depends on the policies by the government there has been flat growth. but we still need to do everything to kickstart the economy. host: with the sanctions encounter sanctions, do you get a feeling you maybe should have done something differently? president putin: i think we have taken the right measures. host: this is a very important question.

do we have enough strength and resources? president putin: we have enough resources, we have enough human capital. we are proud of our talented people, they want to work hard. i talked to people a lot, i know the sentiment. russians are very determined. the job of the president and the central bank is to past -- is to pass this difficult time with minimal costs. it is just about patients. nce. we have to take advantage of this time and we can do it. host: a word on our -- on a new threat that could emerge this year. president putin: there are so many threats so that we cannot forecast.

if we maintain the domestic political situation, if we still have the consolidation of our society, they are no threat. host: mr. president, i still want to ask about -- there is a set of measures taken by the government, but at this point we don't see how it is supposed to work. it seems like the primary strategy is to wait for oil prices to rebound. when oil prices start to go up we will have more money and this will take care of all of our problems. president putin: well, this is an overly critical assessment. certainly, you must always criticize the government and the president and the governors of russian regions. when you have criticism, it

makes you look at things with a fresh look. you need some outsider opinion. nevertheless, the plan to stabilize the economic situation is something that takes a lot of professionalism. we cannot waste our money. certainly, the government needed some time to understand what should be done and what kind of resources could be used. the plan that i mentioned was adopted last december. it is now rolled out .

have, true. nevertheless the steps provided by this plan are well thought out and reflect the state of our economy. the large-scale blueprints, and we have 2.3 trillion rubles for the implementation of this plan. 900 billion will be channeled to help the banking system. that is on the backbone of our economy. of course everyone criticizes the central bank, but we feel these are the right steps. we just need to look back over the 2009 crisis. we also have 250 billion rubles

that will be spent to the economy. we will spend 100 billion rubles to support aviation, aircraft instruction. we will also have 82 billion to support employment. 200 million as guarantees for loans, for certain projects, the central government has a number of steps that are being implemented. they are critical to kickstart growth. also, we have a number of steps for taxation. i'm sure we'll talk about that during the session.

we have a plan that is coming for commuter traffic and the 10% for passenger traffic. the whole range of issues that are being implemented. surely the prices are up, not in all regions, but the ruble has strengthened you cannot say that this is nothing being done. that is not fair. meeting the expectations were higher but i am urging everyone to be patient. we just have to find the right

way forward. host: the reason is strengthening for -- ruble strengthening for a different region]]ason, because interest rates group. >> why did you see that interest rate grow? yes oil prices are up slightly. they see this link with the oil crisis. but still, the ruble has strengthened so much, there must be other factors. we have survived the peak of the problems, also russian banks and russian corporations have paid off their external deathbt in

foreign currency. the central bank does not control exchange rates. unemployment is still thousand -- not as much as in europe. host: we have a lot people representing -- let's take a question from a businessman. guest: hello. the support measures we launched two years ago.

we're the best young project this year. but we have our problems with our human capital. when young people graduate from university they do not know what kind of talent they have. they do not know how they can help russia. maybe the government can help us , help young people to understand how to help. we are ready to share our expertise. >> this is the best way of the right way to do things. personnel training and productive segments is one of our priorities for the near future because production processes are giving

increasingly complex and we need skilled workforces for that. we worked a lot in this area of industry association and we have agreed to take a number of measures together. working together to organize internships and so on and so forth. we cannot proceed with that -- without that, obviously. the government has a special program, but you're right it is best to start at an earlier age when they are in school. i had a discussion with my colleagues, almost 40% of people want to go to university.

it is good they are hungry for knowledge, but this also indicates that we do not have this kind of vocational training in schools. so we will keep working on that. host: let's take another question from our audience. we have our former finance minister. guest: hello, mr. bruton. my question will be on the economy in we saw 7% growth annually. oil prices were around 130. if you take this presidential term, even if the oil prices are

65, our gdp will be about 1.5%. it is lower than the world average, and the share of the russian economy and the global economy will shrink. we will not have enough investment in modernization and high-tech sectors we will be lagging further and further behind. this will impact on the defense industry, which heavily depends upon the state of the economy. the state of technology as a whole. the segments that i just mentioned will have these figures in 2018, we will be liking behind the world average within the next three years.

the government is making some adjustments, but i think adjustments are not enough. the old model is now -- has matured, and is insufficient to we do not have a new development model. what is needed to develop a new development model? >> the work -- we worked together for a large number of years, and we are good friends you may say. i know your position very well, and your forecast is quite accurate and very close to what is happen in reality. first of all, you were one of the authors of the development program for our country for the time until 2020. this is very well known, and basically we have not changed it

radically. so we cannot foresee certain things, part of the blame is yours. but we have to consider the current situation, what is happening with the economy today. we know what we need to do. we have to build better conditions for businesses. we need to create better conditions for private investment. we need to improve our monetary policy. we need to significantly improve our ministry to system in the government as a whole. we need to improve our law enforcement and our judicial systems. it is a multidimensional task.

it is easier said than done, but we definitely have to do it. even though it may look scary, somebody has to do all of this. and definitely there are certain things which are well known to everybody, but which require political will. as you know, in spite of our difficult conditions, we will take certain efforts in the direction recommended by you and other people who share your views. for example, this year the government froze some of the social benefits and did not index them. i know that your colleagues who share your views say this is insufficient.

we should have actually lowered social benefits, cut salaries, incomes. they say we should raise the retirement age as quickly as possible elsewhere will not the -- or else we will not be able to balance the budget. but you haven't healthy economic -- to have a healthy economic policy, you need to have a brain. you also have to have a heart to have people trust us. you have to be able to feel how the ordinary person lives.

if we have trust they will support what they do. and sometimes they will be able to be tougher. but if we disregard how people feel and what happens in real life, very soon we will end up in the situation we had in the early 90's, where the government will lose the trust of the people and we will have two r spending, with much more spending than we do now when we move forward modestly. when we monetize the benefits we took a step, and when it is spend a lot of our resources to take this approach as described.

i think this is sufficient at this point. will this cause our country to rise significantly? we will see. the public debt of the united states is actually higher than the gdp, and this is an alarming signal not just for the united states but for the economy in general. what will happen in the situation? we do not know. the situation, we do not know. will they be able to tackle the situation? we do not know that. they will certainly be guided by

consideration of high growth rates, but we will do this anyway that will not put so much burden on our people. we always respect your opinions, including me. i mean it. we will always listen to your recommendations. >> a follow-up question. one of the structured reforms is the reform of the social center. we don't propose to stop the growth of real wages. we just wanted to make targeted

payments subcategories might need a higher salary while some of the categories do not need their salaries to be adjusted as high. we believe this targeted approach is more efficient especially in a crisis situation like we are facing today. our proposals is about 18%. then wages would not have performed. now we saw the adjustment the

presidential council has been not too hard, we need to step of activity and also the 2020 strategy was a drafted, not adopted. currently, we need something for the sanctions. >> i completely agree with you on the point of selective approach and offering benefits.

you also mention salaries growing ahead of activity. i presented my position to you. i agree with you to a certain extent but this is easier said than done. is it -- it is easy to talk about this but the expectations are too low. on the whole, we should do our best for salaries to grow. >> today the ukrainian counterparts decided to reach a

compromise on the iranian issue. all of the stakeholders now confirm that the deal is reached and there are just technicalities that need to be finalized. that is why we have taken this decision. i did not see the statement by the subject chiller of germany -- sub chancellor of germany. maybe our counterparts are not aware of the fact that the un's sanctions do not include military equipment like the s 300. it is a decision that we are now a part. we now see that there are

trends. there are no grounds to continue with this uterine oral band. we will in efforts with our partners, and our contribution has been really particular to the issue. our enterprises have produced this equipment that is very expensive. the cost is $900 million. no one has compensated these losses. indicated some time ago, they indicated they might buy from us. it is not part of the u.n. ban.

i think it is important to encourage our iranian counterparts. you also mentioned the reports from israel. well, when we supply our military equipment to a certain region would take into account the big picture, especially in the middle east and we are not the biggest supplier of equipment and weapons to the middle east. the u.s. supplies more equipment to these parts of the world, and just recently israel voice their concerns about the supplies to another region. they said it could lead to geopolitical changes in the

region. it is not an offensive weapon, but among my colleagues said no plane would be lifted within the year. one of the partners, we understood those concerns and we cancel that contract altogether. we even paid back the advance 400 million u.s. dollars. as for ron, it is a totally different issue. it is not a threat for israel it is offensive agreement -- defense of equipment, i am sorry. it is only used for defense. even if you talk about

situations in yemen, it can only be a detergent2 -- deterrence. we want to see the ukrainian economy, out of the crisis. because they are our neighbors our partners, and we are interested in having a stable situation on our borders, and developing economic relations with our neighbors. the reason we offer a lower prices in gases because we know their economy will not be able to pay the market price. at the end of the year before the last one beyond of 2013 we made an agreement with the ukrainian leadership that we would offer ukraine a loan on

their securities. we were going to give them $15 billion a year, and $5 billion more for construction through commercial banks. what did ukraine get from their partners to date? $17.5 billion for four years. we offer them a reduced gas price, as long as they pay regularly, and they settle their debts. we reduce the price of natural gas, and now it is 300% higher. we would keep our cooperation tice intact, but now they are severed. of course our situation is not so good, but their situation is really bad. they have lost high-tech

competencies in missile construction, shipbuilding, and so on. i think the consequences are severe and it is not clear why they had to do all of that. still, this is the situation we are in. we will do our best to rebuild our relations with ukraine. this is in our interest. >> some follow-up questions from guests in the studio. >> mr. president, joseph brodsky the famous poet, he once said, i heard a poem on ukraine independence and he wrote about the nationalists in ukraine. but apart from nationalists, there are millions of simple and ordinary ukrainians living there. they are now under threat.

there are many examples, we have -- so people, the locals, the security agency asks people to frame other people. one of the former mp's was killed, gunned down. you've also got lots of threats from nationalists. and all of the laws taken by the ukrainian parliament ahead of may 9, victory day. so i think they are trying to impose the apartheid policy against russian speaking populations. ukraine says that russia is an enemy.

they are asking for discounts for natural gas. if you look realistically, how and under what conditions can we normalize the relationship? president putin: this is not a simple question. even though we could talk about russians and ukrainians being one nation. i often do that. actually, it is quite simple. today, russia does not accept anything from the kiev authorities except one thing -- treat us as equal partners in every way. of course, it is important for us that they respect the legitimate rights of ethnic russians living in ukraine and people who consider themselves

russians regardless of what it says in their passport. people who consider the russian language their mother tongue and who think they belong to the russian culture. any country is interested in people like that. including russia. there is nothing extraordinary about that. i repeat, we are interested in normalizing our relations with ukraine entirely and we will do all we can from our side. of course, the situation is a big problem with the donbass. we expect the ukrainian authorities will abide by all the minsk agreements. first and foremost, they have to set up a working group as part of the minsk process. they have to start working on

several areas -- political reform, constitutional reform, the economy, border issues and so on. they have to start doing those things. not talk about these things but start doing them practically. at this point, unfortunately, we only see attempts to continue to exert pressure and no real desire to solve the conflict through political means. it is my understanding there is no other solution except for a political one. i hope that everybody will come to the same realization. >> another question from our studio. irina is well-known in russia. she has a question on ukraine.

>> mr. president, my question, number one, is about the tragic death of boris nemtsov. it shook me as a person. you might understand me, we have cooperated with him. it is really a painful event. what is your take on the investigation. will we know who ordered that contract killing? it looks more like a terrorist act. what about political competition -- will your political opponents like navalny, khordrokovsky and others be ready?

will there be conditions for them to take part in parliamentary elections? maybe that will stabilize the situation and stimulate the private sector and draw in a private investment. during the funeral, journalists came up to me. there are also online reports that boris nemtsov got information on the presence of russian troops southeast of ukraine and also during the funeral, western journalists asked me about it. can you clarify -- can you give us more details? were there russian troops or not. president putin: let's start with the opposition which had the right and the possibility to

participate officially and legally in politics. number one, they can and they should. number two, if they make it into parliament, if they have people's support, their activity will have an official status and they will certainly be responsible to a degree for the things they offer. but you are an experienced person. you have been in the government. it is wanting to be in the opposition and to criticize everything. there is no responsibility, not too much responsibility involved. still this brings you to the forefront, brings you out of the shadows. that is something positive, i think. in the long run, the bottom line is it is up to the people to decide who should be in the parliament. i think this would be a positive development. on your question regarding the assassination of boris nemtsov you were his friend. he was in the opposition.

he criticized me and the government even though i used to have a pretty close relationship with him in the past. like i said in the past, it is a tragic and shapemeful event. this assassination. about the investigation, i can tell you that one day or 36 hours after this happened, fsb and the police investigators knew the names of perpetrators and the only question they had was how to arrest them. let's give credit to our law enforcement agencies. this was objective data. it is not just security footage. they have many different

technical capabilities available. i don't want to say too much because i do not want to divulge the advanced methods they use. the methods they use in their work. on the whole, this matter was taken care of within a few hours. they did a very professional job quickly. they used several channels simultaneously. different agencies worked simultaneously and they all achieved the same results. whether they will find a mastermind behind this association and whether there is such a person, i don't know yet. it will become clear with time. they are working. finally, you asked whether our troops are present in ukraine. i can tell you there are no

russian troops in ukraine. actually, during the recent conflict in southeastern ukraine in donbass, the head of the general staff of ukrainian army openly and publicly said one meeting with foreign colleagues our war is not against the russian army. what else can you add to that? >> as a follow-up question, what is the reason why russian foreign-policy failed in ukraine? russia invested up to $33 billion u.s. dollars. the u.s., only $5 billion. that was the confession by victoria nuland. president putin: it is not our failure. it is the failure of ukraine's domestic policy. yes, we helped ukraine.

even when it was a very difficult time for us ourselves. we supplied them with fuel at a much lower price than the international market price. this was a real economic aid that ran into dozens of billions of dollars. this is no exaggeration. we had very close cooperation and i hope it may be recovered somehow in the future. we also had all sorts of trade relations. what happened? people were tired of poverty of fraud,

embezzlement, greed of government officials, corruption of oligarchs in the government. people got tired of all of that. when the nation is in this kind of condition, they start looking for ways out and unfortunately sometimes they turn to people who take advantage of the current difficulties and offers a simple solution, including nationalists. this happened in russia as well in the 1990's. we had what they called the sovereignty parade and nationalism. yes, we had very similar situations in russia. this is what happens in ukraine. all of these nationalist forces took advantage of the situation and as a result, you have the situation we have today.

it is not our failure, it is the failure of ukraine itself. perhaps we missed that alienation process. >> there is a threat in other posts soviet countries. if you look at the number of nonprofits, they are financed by the u.s. how much does russia spend on the activities? it is much lower. president putin: you had a freudian slip. you said alienation of ukraine. a sovereign country. you should respect that. in the 1990's, when we declared sovereignty of the russian federation, it was quite a step. we liberated them from ourselves.

we did this ourselves. since we made this decision, we have to respect their independence now. this is the church the people of ukraine have made. it is up to them to decide how to build this relationship. during the previous ukrainian crisis, how did this happen? they had been third round of elections. this was totally unconstitutional. we turned a blind eye and we kept working with them. now, we cannot. we see this upsurge of nationalists and this is unacceptable. we have to respect other countries, we have to build our relationships with them. other than that, it is beyond our control.

what i mean is these are independent nations and we cannot meddle in their affairs we cannot interfere. this would be wrong. we build our relations as part of a -- our economic union with kazakhstan, belarus, these alliances it is not to make those nations closer to us. the significance is to create better conditions for all the people living in our countries to have open borders we don't care if a russian person lives here on this territory or cross the border. we care about their rights not being infringed upon, they are allowed to speak their mother tongue. if that is the case, we don't care if people have a good life

in those countries and they are treated fairly -- this is the kind of relationship we have with kazakhstan and armenia. we would like this growth -- this is the main thing -- it is not that the want to keep those countries under our influence. it is not our goal to rebuild an empire like they accuse us. this is a natural integration process. the whole world is thinking this way of integration. latin america, in north america also, we see the u.s. and canada, europe, asia everywhere. when we do the same thing, they tell us we are building an empire. why can't we have integration? it is not our goal to build an empire. we do not have imperial aspirations. we want to make sure russians

living in neighboring countries have a decent life by developing our cooperation with them. >> russia is a country where thousands of the ukrainians found refuge. take the town on the border of the ukraine. we have our reporter working there. reporter: hello, moscow we are reporter: hello, moscow we are at a hotel in the rostov region. refugees from ukraine live here. most of them came weeks ago and they are deciding where to go and whether they will find a job. there are 19 people in this

hotel including several children. all the necessary conditions have been created for them. all of the children go to school. younger children have therapy sessions. we spent a few days here and got to know them. we would like to introduce you. this guy, how are you? >> four. >> where did you come from? tell us about your hometown. can you tell us about it? tell us about luhansk. >> it was bombed. we were in sevastopol first. now it has been destroyed. reporter: let's go to the living room now. while we are on our way can i ask you where do you come from?

>> i also come from luhansk. reporter: do you have other relatives there? >> my grandmother is there. reporter: when was the last time you talked to them? >> it has been a while. i sometimes talk to them on social networks. reporter: do you miss them? >> yes. reporter: you can address them directly. you can tell them whatever you want. the camera is over there. >> i just want to say hello to all of my friends and my grandmother and grandfather and my father. reporter: they will see you. take your seats now. currently in the rostov region alone, there are 38,000 refugees from ukraine. they have a lot of questions. let's start. what is your first question? >> hello my name is alexander. we want to know what will happen to our regions in the future.

what will happen to those territories? what are the prospects of becoming separated? even though many people like the ukraine, because of this conflict, there is no way for us to live together. can you give me the status of those territories? the future of our regions together. president putin: first of all, we need to get life back to normal. all of the people must go back to their homes. i know that people who live in dunbas, i know that you are all

patriots. people stay there because they love their homeland. you must create conditions for normal living, you must earn money, raise children. got to have conditions for that. we need to revive economic times. our generation in ukraine is based on coal. it is ridiculous to buy coal

from south africa or australia. that is silly but we see it. there are other types of attempts to revive economic times. we are seeing this happening -- the first steps. the start of the minsk agreement , we might find some provisions that were held to restore the single political space but of course, it is the people of the republic that have the ultimate right to decide and will depend on the flexibility and wisdom of

the ukrainian leadership. >> we have people working at this hotel with us, people who live here, and they have many difficult questions. >> mr. president, my name is tatiana. we live on the border. we are very much afraid for our children and grandchildren during the hostility. it was very close to where we live. we had our suitcases packed. do you think the war will start? president putin: i think it is impossible. so, don't worry. there were some instances. some of the shells ended up on russian territory but i still think it is just an accident

not an intended attempt to attack russia or to damage russian infrastructure. >> mr. president, we have received tragic news from kiev right now. this is one of the brightest well known ukrainian journalist. he was just killed. he participated on talk shows of russian channels more than once. this tragedy just happened hours ago. just the other day, he was killed. president putin: this is not the first political killing.

there was a series of there was a series of assassinations. you had one who asked him about the investigation of horsemen solve -- boris nemtsov. i said it was a disgrace to russia and the law enforcement is doing everything to find those who executed, and those who ordered it, and the ukraine wants to be a democratic state it has to do the same. but nothing like that is happening. where are the killers? europe and the u.s. turn a blind eye to it. reporter: of course, first and foremost, we would like to express condolences to the family and his colleagues.