Fiscal rule could be adjusted after Crimean settlements - Putin aide
PETROZAVODSK. April 29 (Interfax) - There are no plans to adjust Russia's fiscal rule just yet but this could be done once settlements on the amounts needed to support Crimea are out of the way, Andrei Belousov, a Russian presidential aide, told reporters.
"As [Prime Minister] Dmitry Anatolyevich [Medvedev] has already said, if circumstances dictate, there could be changes," Belousov said. He said the fiscal rule should exist in one form or another, but "the question is what it should look like."
"In our time, in my view, we overdid this threshold. So far, at any rate, we're carrying out this decision and making it. For now we're not changing it for 2014," Belousov said.
However, it will be possible to revisit modifying the fiscal rule after a number of discussions, he said. "I think that this is possible under certain conditions," Belousov said. But he said does not think U.S. sanctions against Russian citizens and companies are substantial reasons to change the fiscal rule.
Asked whether Crimea being joined with Russia was a substantial reason for such a change, Belousov said this would "require fairly large investments in the economy of the peninsula." There will have to be investment in logistics, in roads, the Kerch bridge, water supplies and other areas, he said, estimating that the cost of supplying water to the peninsula will range from 10 billion to 15 billion rubles and annual spending on the road network will amount to 6 billion-7 billion rubles.
"Therefore, when we add all this up, sum up possibilities, I don't rule out that we will have to look for some kind of solutions outside the fiscal rule," Belousov said.
Another factor that could lead to a modification of the fiscal rule is the depreciation of the ruble and capital outflow, he said. "This significantly changes the situation, and we will have to somehow look for possibilities here as well," Belousov said.