ST. PETERSBURG, June 1. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin believes it is too early to speculate whether he will participate in the 2018 presidential election.

"Not now," Putin replied, when asked at a meeting with the heads of the world’s leading news agencies, when asked when he would be able to say something about the possibility of his participation in the election.

"I still don’t know myself when," Putin said, adding that "the presidential election date is a little less than a year away and this is a lot of time in a quickly changing world."

"Time is not ripe yet," he reiterated. He explained that as soon presidential election campaign or any other campaign began, "everybody stops working and starts rushing about here, there and everywhere, surfing the world webб and nobody wants to work in earnest any more."

"The later it begins, the better," Putin concluded.