(headline adjusted of news item issued at 9:29 a.m.)

MOSCOW. March 28 (Interfax) - The Russian economy could contract by a "symbolic" amount and net capital outflows could total $150 billion-$160 billion in 2014, which will be the country's payment for an "independent foreign policy," former Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin, a member of the Russian president's economic council, believes.

"My forecast is that economic growth will be about zero to plus/minus 0.5%. We will literally be on the edge, we could get symbolic negative growth," Kudrin told reporters.

He recalled that he earlier forecast potential capital outflows in the first three months after the imposition of U.S. and European sanctions against Russia at $50 billion.

"I even meant this for the second wave of sanctions, but there was such an outflow as a result of the first wave. I think that in the next three months we will have an outflow of another $50 billion, but then this will subside. Nonetheless, for the year it will be significantly more than $100 billion, I think about $150 billion-$160 billion," Kudrin said.

Kudrin said this is "payment for the fact that we want to conduct an independent foreign policy," to which "society is willing to agree for now."

He said Russia will pay "hundreds of billions of dollars" for its decision in regard to Crimea and Sevastopol "that we will not get in the form of GDP growth, investments, budget revenues and additional expenditures," but this price is not "critical."

"We have hundreds of billions of dollars in payment for this turn of events. But I believe that this is not a critical price for making those decisions," Kudrin said, remarking that these decisions cannot be assessed only in economic terms.

"If this was a choice that was broadly supported, we should understand that it has an economic price, but for now, in my view, [