Russian Embassy | News & Culture

🎙 President of Russia Vladimir Putin's statement to the media following talks with General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Vietnam, President of Vietnam To Lam (Moscow, September 9, 2026) Before addressing the media, the Leaders oversaw an exchange of documents signed during President To Lam’s state visit to Russia. 💬 Vladimir Putin: Russia and Vietnam are strategic partners, and relations between our countries have consistently been built on the principles of equality, mutual respect and consideration for each other’s interests. Our peoples are bound by truly strong and long-standing ties of friendship, comradeship-in-arms, mutual assistance and support. In its time, the Soviet Union did a great deal to help the young Vietnamese state withstand the struggle for freedom and independence, while also contributing to the development of its economy, social sector and infrastructure and to personnel training. It is on this solid foundation that Russia-Vietnam cooperation continues to develop successfully and acquire new practical substance. A number of major joint projects are being implemented. The Intergovernmental Commission is operating effectively, while regular dialogue is maintained between the Foreign Ministries, security councils, parliaments, political parties and public organizations. Today, Comrade To Lam, members of his delegation and I discussed the state of bilateral cooperation in detail, exchanged views on current regional and international issues and, of course, outlined priorities for further deepening the Russia-Vietnam partnership. These priorities are reflected in the final Joint Statement. Considerable attention was devoted to economic issues. We noted with satisfaction that trade increased by 5.7% in 2025. But, of course, as our dear friend and guest pointed out, this is not enough. In absolute terms, the overall volume still falls short of our potential. 📈 Nevertheless, the trend is positive: in the first half of 2026, trade grew by a further 13.8%. This positive momentum is largely the result of the free trade agreement concluded between Vietnam and the Eurasian Economic Union. The agreement has helped boost mutual investment and intensify technology exchanges. ☝️ Importantly, Russia and Vietnam are consistently shifting to national currencies in mutual settlements and building reliable channels of financial and banking cooperation. In this way, we are protecting bilateral trade from the negative impact of the global political environment and volatility on world markets. Today, Comrade To Lam and I opened by video link a new modern laboratory at the Russia-Vietnam Tropical Research and Technology Centre in Hanoi. The laboratory will focus on disease prevention, the development of medicines and a number of other tasks relevant to tropical climates. Our discussion of current global and regional issues confirmed that the positions of Vietnam and Russia largely coincide or are very close. Our countries firmly uphold the principles of the supremacy of international law, sovereignty and non-interference in internal affairs, and jointly support stable and sustainable development in the Asia-Pacific Region. 🤝 We discussed all these matters in detail with our Vietnamese colleagues, stressing the importance of continuing to coordinate our efforts at key multilateral platforms, including within the #RussiaASEAN dialogue. Read in full 🇷🇺🇻🇳 #RussiaVietnam

#KievRegimeCrimes ⚡️ Ambassador-at-Large of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs Rodion Miroshnik: 💬 From August 31 to September 6, аgainst the backdrop of substantial retaliatory strikes by the Russian Armed Forces against military and dual-use facilities on Ukrainian territory, as well as short-term, mutually observed targeted restrictions on strikes while US representatives visiting Russia and Ukraine for consultations on a peaceful settlement were present there, the number of terrorist attacks by Ukrainian armed groups and civilian casualties somewhat declined compared with the previous week. At the same time, the figures remained very high: more than 300 civilians were affected, with 46 people killed as a result of criminal Ukrainian attacks on civilian facilities in Russia. The highest numbers of civilian casualties from Ukrainian attacks were recorded in the Belgorod Region, DPR and LPR, and the Zaporozhye and Kherson regions. Ukrainian strike drones remained the main cause of civilian deaths and injuries. A total of 309 civilians, or 99% of all those affected, were killed or injured in Ukrainian UAV strikes. From August 31 to September 6, shelling by Ukrainian Nazis affected 312 civilians: 266 people were injured, including 13 children. A total of 46 people were killed, including 2 children. Over the past seven days, Ukrainian militants fired at least 6,650 munitions at civilian facilities on Russian territory.

🎙 MFA Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova on the actual circumstances surrounding the Grain Deal (September 9, 2026): Following the launch of the special military operation, Western countries imposed unilateral and illegal restrictive measures against Russia. The unlawful restrictions introduced by Brussels, Washington and London in circumvention of the #UN Security Council had an extremely negative impact on the access of Russian producers of fertilisers and foodstuffs to global markets. In July 2022, the “grain deal” was concluded in Istanbul. ✍️ The “grain deal” consisted of two elements: the Memorandum of Understanding between the Russian Federation and the UN Secretariat on facilitating the promotion of Russian food products and fertilisers to world markets, and the Initiative on the Safe Transportation of Grain and Foodstuffs from Ukrainian Ports. The key objective of the “package” agreement proposed by UN Secretary-General António Guterres was presented as ensuring global food security and reducing the threat of hunger in the countries most in need, above all on the African continent. This was how the initiative was portrayed. On our part, these arrangements were implemented in good faith for a year. For example, 32.8 million tonnes of foodstuffs were exported from the ports of Odessa, Chernomorsk and Yuzhny. 👉 70% (26.3 million tonnes) of this volume went to countries with high and upper-middle income levels. Let me emphasise this point. The UN narrative was presented as being about supplying food to those in need. Yet, as it turned out, Western countries directed the bulk of these supplies to countries that were clearly prosperous. The EU alone accounted for 40%. ❗️African countries received only 4.1 million tonnes of grain. This inconvenient, to put it mildly, statistic was never highlighted in the West. Instead, there was an enormous media campaign. Hardly a day went by without the Western press covering the issue. Why? They needed to feed themselves, make money and ensure their own Western food security. As always, however, they invoked the interests of countries in need as a pretext. The West placed its hopes in a powerful PR campaign portraying the UN initiative as having no alternative, while in reality it proved to be pseudo-humanitarian in nature. This is yet another shameful episode in Mr Guterres’ record as UN Secretary-General. While hiding behind lofty slogans and operating under the “flag” of the UN, Western countries pursued the interests of their own corporations: they purchased agricultural products cheaply from Kiev, supplied raw materials to their processing industries and then resold finished food products at higher prices, including to the very African countries in need that they claimed to be concerned about – in reality, profiting from them. As for the Russian component of the “grain deal”, experience demonstrated that during the three years of the Russia-UN Memorandum, no meaningful progress was made in implementing its provisions. The “package” agreement proposed by Mr Guterres proved to be a one-way street, on which, once again, only Western countries benefited. ☝️ We should also bear in mind Ukraine’s actual agricultural potential, whose role as a “breadbasket of the world” is currently being artificially exaggerated. Ukraine’s share of global wheat exports did not exceed 5%. Today, it is objectively even lower. #FoodSecurity #RussiaWithAfrica