Vladimir Putin Met In Washington With Representatives Of Jewish Organisations And With Russian Athletes

After his meeting with representatives of the US business and public-political elite Russian leader Vladimir Putin held at the Russian Embassy a number of working meetings with some of the invited persons. The head of the Russian state met specifically with representatives of Jewish organisations. After the meeting chairman of the conference of Main Jewish Organisations in the USA Murtemer Zuckerman told journalists that the Jewish organisations of the USA come out for abrogation of the Jackson-Vanek amendment with regard to Russia. For his part, chief Rabbi of Russia Berl Lazar who also participated in the meeting highly appraised today's speech of the president of Russia and the intermediate results of his US visit. "Today the whole world has learnt that Russia is a superpower again. The future of Russia and the future of the Jews in Russia will be great", Lazar believes. Vladimir Putin also met with Russian athletes, in particular with chairman of the Russian Olympic Committee Leonid Tyagachev and well-known Russian ice hockey player Vyacheslav Fetisov who works in the national hockey team of the USA and is also the coach of the National Olympic hockey team of Russia. As Fetisov said, the state of Russian ice hockey had, in particular, been discussed at the meeting. He noted that "the Olympic team of Russia is now taking contours". There are now six teams in the world, among them the Russian squad, which have a chance to win at the future Olympics, Fetisov stated.