Russian rouble banknotes and coins are paid by a customer to a vendor at a market in Omsk, Russia. (File photo by Reuters)

Russia’s President Vladimir Putin has said that the resourceful Russian economy not only withstood the Western sanctions, but also became stronger in the process.

In general, the situation is stable. We have overcome all the sanctions-related issues, and have started the next stage of economic development on a new basis, which is fundamentally important, Putin stated on Thursday in Sochi at the 20th annual meeting of the Valdai Discussion Club, which was attended by experts, politicians, diplomats, and economists from 42 countries.

He said, essentially Western sanction have been restructuring the Russian economy in a positive way.

The Russian government recorded over 660bn roubles ($6.6bn) in budget surplus in the third quarter of 2023 and there will be a deficit of around 1 percent of GDP for the year, media reported, adding that the country’s budget deficit was expected to remain at the same level in the near future. We are coping. And I have reason to believe that we will cope in the future.

Putin said the rate of unemployment in the country had dropped to 3 percent, the lowest rate ever recorded in Russia.

He said in Russia, contrary to the situation in the EU, disposable incomes continued to grow.

He said the government was spending more on defense and security, but it did not trade the nation’s bread and butter for guns and the government remained committed to all its public duties.

The Russia leader assured that the country was totally self-sufficient in providing its basic food requirements.

The United States and certain Western allies slapped a slew of sanction on Russia after Moscow launched the war in February 2022.