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Extra expenses on Putin’s address to exceed $31 bln in 3 years

Those are mainly additional federal budget expenditures, the finance minister said

Russia's Finance Minister Anton Siluanov Stanislav Krasilnikov/TASS

Russia's Finance Minister Anton Siluanov

© Stanislav Krasilnikov/TASS

MOSCOW, February 13. /TASS/. Extra expenditures on implementation of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s State of the Nation Address will exceed 2 trillion rubles ($31.4 bln) in the next three years, with over 1.8 trillion rubles ($28.3 bln) worth of federal budget funds, Finance Minister Anton Siluanov said at a government meeting on Thursday.

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"All provisions of the address have been included in amendments to the budget law. Additional expenditures for three years will be worth over 2 trillion rubles ($31.4 bln). Those are mainly additional federal budget expenditures worth over 1.8 trillion rubles ($28.3 bln). Russian substituent entities’ additional expenditures are projected at around 190 bln rubles ($2.9 bln)," he said.

Extra non-oil and gas revenues, as well as saved transfers to the Pension Fund are the sources of funds for such budget expenditures, the minister noted.

"Those are surely the so-called reserves, conditionally approved expenditures that will be made in the second and third years of the three-year period. That means that our possibilities of using those reserves in coming years are declining," he said, adding though that "it is necessary to ensure the focus of (president’s) address by respective resources."

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