these are not people who are doing any of their work for glory. they were doing work as their duties for serving the united states of america. they were servants of the government, servants of the government trying to protect the united states against russian malfeasance and russian organized crime and russian money laundering and effectively trump is considering handing them over to an enemy state. that's got to be the most shocking part of this whole story. >> russian president vladimir putin addressed russian ambassadors in moscow today where he talked about foreign policy objectives and diplomatic efforts. he referenced the recent helsinki summit with president trump and accused the u.s. of downplaying what he felt were positive results of the meeting. president putin was joined on stage and introduced by russian foreign minister sergey lavrov. this is just under 20 minutes.

mr. lavrov: mr. president. this is the ninth meeting of russia's ambassadors and representatives. ♪

mr. lavrov: mr. president, colleagues, i'd like to express my sincere gratitude to the president of the russian federation, vladimir putin, for paying so much attention to the diplomatic service in terms of the context of what we do, his assessment of our actions and also social support for our diplomats and answering

whatever questions may arise. we understand given the current situation in the international arena, the responsibility that lies on our diplomatic work in implementing the policy defined by the president is immense. and we will do -- we will always do our best to prove up to the task. we would also thank the government of the russian federation's, members of the cabinet, the president here working together. we will be able to create necessary conditions in the international arena for our country. i give the floor now to the president of the russian federation, mr. vladimir putin. president putin: thank you. lleagues, i'm happy to see

you at our meeting. first of all, i'd like to thank the leadership of the foreign ministry, all the diplomats, all the veterans of the diplomatic service for your contribution in developing international cooperation of our country. all of our diplomatic mission works together in a well-coordinated way. given the current situation in the world, russia has been consistently pursuing an independent and well-balanced foreign policy. russia's involvement in international affairs is based on our key national interests. to create favorable and safe conditions for our country's breakthrough development to address social and economic tasks at hand, improve the quality of life for our people. our people want russia to be a

strong independent country. we are open to have equal partnerships with all countries and regional alliances. being a permanent member of the u.n. security council, russia will always remain committed to the basic principles of this organization's sovereignty, equality, noninterference in the internal affairs of other states and fair resolution of all conflicts. working collectively based on international law, we can address the most complex international issues. our pursuit of global security and stability, countering new threats and challenges is in much demand worldwide. our allies share our -- our allies in -- share the views on the basic principles of the new world order.

these countries constitute the majority of the balanced population. this is the approach that we will use in resolving key international crisis. in syria we were able to defeat international terrorism, isis and other terrorist groups. thus, we were able to preserve the statehood of syria and create conditions for the restoration of the syrian economy and bringing back refugees. once again, i'd like to thank our military for their professionalism and, of course, diplomats, too. they were also very much involved in what we're doing in syria. in a is doing good work the [inaudible] process. earlier this year, we heard syrian national dialogue in so

muchi which was hugely -- in sochi which was hugely successful, creating conditions or legitimate restoration of the syrian -- the next step would be constitutional commission and adoption of a new constitution under the united nations. of course, humanitarian efforts to support syria are also important. we are very much involved in that. this will be important for syria, for this region as a whole and for many other countries around the world because this would decrease the immigration burden on european countries. collective efforts and dialogue is what russia has always proposed for the -- we worked together in china to prepare a plan normalize the situation there. we are happy that the principles proposed by us proved useful. the parties came to the

negotiation table and abandoned actions which could have caused dramatic consequences. recent positive trends, which were partly due to the efforts taken by president trump will continue further, but we also have negative examples where agreements we have reached together are abandoned. for example, i'm referring to the steps taken by the united states in withdrawing from the joint comprehensive plan of action. currently, it's extremely important to preserve this deal. and prevent uncontrolled growth of tensions in the middle east. the situation in southeastern ukraine remains complex. the reasons are the same. the current authorities refuse to honor the commitments they have made in resolving this

conflict. they're unwilling to engage in a dialogue with their own citizens. force. relying on brute we still believe the minsk agreements remain the only foundation for peaceful resolution of the situation. colleagues, what we are doing in the international arena, we don't do this just for the sake of some greatness or to create problems for others. our goal, once again, i repeat, is to create conditions for our country's economic development. within the next two years, russia should firmly secure a place among the top five economic superpowers around the world and improve our people. to achieve these strategic goals, we have to take advantage of all the opportunities that we have in the international arena. we should be practical.

securing new markets, expanding our -- bringing in new technology, overcome existing barriers that stand in the way of russian companies working abroad. the principle competition and openness is often replaced with protectionism in the international trade today. markets daily are replaced with political expediency. trade is being politicized. russia's foreign policy on the contrary should be more economically oriented and more rational. this is particularly important to create good neighborly relations, security and stability around our country. the uerashean economic union is a -- you eurasia economic union is key. we're happy our partners are working with us.

and this work is quite effective. we are using degration opportunities to stimulate the growth of the economies of all member states. and we want people and companies to feel the practical result of this work. we have a free trade zone with vietnam. we're engaged in talks with israel. serbia, singapore, soon we'll start talks with india. we have prepared a free trade agreement with iran. on the whole, we have about 50 treaties being prepared with the eurosect. we have good prospects in working together with china. signed an agreement with china on trade cooperation. euro sect and china's initiative of one belt, one road complement each other, harmonizing these projects will

provide a strong foundation for asian -- eurasian. and we need to have a relationship with the european union. the e.u. remains one of our key trade partners. we have a lot of economic interests in common with the e.u. for decades, we've been developing together our transport and infrastructure. all the business projects that we have with europe, including, or example, are purely commercial. economically feasible. there is mo political subtext -- no political subtext to it. the key to ensuring security and stability in europe is in extending cooperation and rebuilding trust. not in deploying new military bases and military infrastructure close to the

russian borders, which is happening right now. such aggressive actions pozzing a direct threat to russia, we'll respond to them appropriately. trying to agues, draw the ukraine or georgia into nato should consider the consequences of their irresponsible policies. what we need today is constructive positive agenda, bringing our positions closer. this is what we discussed in my meeting with u.s. president donald trump. even though our views are different, we both agreed that relations between russia and the u.s. are unsatisfactory. in many ways, they're even worse than during the cold war. it would be naive to think problems that have been accumulated over the years can be resolved within just a few hours. nobody expected that, of

course. still still we started on our way toward this gell. the cooperation with russian partners, willing to sacrifice the interest of allies in europe and the mete, for example, i'm referring to israel. we also talked about the go lan heights when we talked about syria and it seems like they're not interested in that. they're also willing to sacrifice the issues of their own security. 'd like to point out to you in 2021 the new start treaty will xpire. we know there are certain forces in the world that would sacrifice relations for the sake of their domestic political goals. they are ready to sacrifice the interests of their businesses, u.s. companies are losing millions in contracts, losing obs.

the cooperation with russian partners, willing to sacrifice the interest of allies in europe and the mete, for example, i'm referring to israel. we also talked about the go lan heights when we talked about yria and it seems like they're not interested in that. they're also willing to sacrifice the issues of their wn security. i'd like to point out to you in 2021 the new start treaty will xpire. we can live without this treaty, just a few years ago we could have lived without this treaty but we did the right thing and signed this treaty and we need to start working today to prolock, to extend the

-- prolong, to extend this treaty. overs in a year and a half it will just run out its course and there will be no more treaty any onger. when i talk about these forces in the united states, you know, this is not in line with our political philosophy because e've always been taught that people who work for the state in the interest of their nation should first and foremost think about the fundamental principles, fundamental values of the country but there are forces in the united states that only care about their own private interests. these are the kind of people who are pitiful, despicable eople.

as they were described in soviet books. but on the contrary, i think these people are quite smart sometimes. for example, when they want to feed their stories to people they use this, not to praise someone or criticize someone, the reason i mention this is because i want us to take this into account in our practical work when we deal with americans. these are just facts that we face today. vush open to develop context with the united states as long as they're based on equality.

this is not something that just our two countries need. the whole world needs this. being two nuclear superpowers we have special responsibility for global security and stability. now i'd like to say a few words on a couple of different subjects. the world cup has just completed. we had many world leaders visiting our country and also hundreds of thousands of football fans from all over the world. they saw a different kind of russia. russia that is open to the world. russia that is friendly. this season obviously -- this is a break through, this is what we call popular democracy and you made an important contribution to that as well. congratulations. thank you. colleagues, of course, the burden on the foreign ministry, on the diplomatic mission, will only keep increasing more and more. but i would like to assure you that russia's leadership will always do everything necessary to support you, take care of your material situation, protect people who work in the foreign ministry. we have made a numb of important

decisions. at the same time, on some of the sensitive issues, salary, social guarantees for your family members, housing, -- housing conditions, we haven't been able to fully resolve those issues yet and i would like a cabinet, the government, to pay special attention to these matters and not deal with them in a bureaucratic manner. e need to provide proper conditions for our diplomats to perform their professional functions. this is extremely important. this concludes the first part of my speech and the next part will take place behind closed doors without the media. [captioning performed by the national captioning institute, which is responsible for its caption content and accuracy. visit ncicap.org] [captions copyright national able satellite corp. 2018] >> earlier this week, senate intelligence committee vice chair mark warner of virginia d