RUSSKY ISLAND, Primorye Territory, September 8 (Itar-Tass) —— Far Eastern Federal University “must become a strong intellectual base – the region has no future without it,” Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said on Thursday, summing up the results of the forum on the use of the heritage of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) and development of Far Eastern Federal University.
“We cannot have standard universities. But we will use here the most contemporary standards, quite often ahead of our practice,” the premier said. “What has been accumulated in our educational system for ages must be reflected here,” he said.
“I do ask you to treat this as a common cause of state importance, the task of the development of Russia’s Far East,” the premier said.
“We realize full well the importance of the Far East for the country’s development. It is also an outlet to the market of countries of the Asia Pacific region, which means vast resources. But historic circumstances were such that the region developed at a rather slow pace,” Putin noted.
He recalled that until recently there had been “no highway linking the Far East with the European part of the country. The KVzhd railway was built by the time of the war with Japan, the Trans-Siberian Railway was built, the Baikal-Amur Mainline (BAM) was built at the time of the aggravation of relations with the other neighbor, but there has been until recently no communication by road,” Putin said.
“We will continue progressing; we will develop power engineering; the gas pipeline stretching from Sakhalin went into operation and the construction of a gas pipeline from Yakutia will begin next year,” Putin said.