David Stanton (Cork East, Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I join others in welcoming the ambassador. He is a very impressive diplomat. I have seen him in action before and he does his job well, so I congratulate him on that.

I am from Cork and I know many of the fishermen he dealt with last week. We were very pleased the Russian Navy and the Irish fishers fleet would not be coming head to head in the Atlantic. That was a good outcome. When was the last time the Russian Navy carried out exercises in the Irish exclusive economic zone such as those recently planned? When was the last time such exercises occurred there, if ever? That is one question.

The second question is on economics. The last time we spoke I asked the ambassador about the impact of Covid-19 in Russia and on the people in Russia. It has has an impact in many countries, so he might give us a quick overview of the impact of that disease on the Russian people and economy.

I have been wondering about this for quite some time and take the opportunity to ask the question. How would the ambassador describe the political system in Russia? Is it a democracy, an autocracy or a pseudo-democracy? How would he describe their political system? How would he describe the Russian economic system? Is it capitalist? What is it? In the past there was socialism involved in the USSR, in the early days, but what is it now in the ambassador's view?

He has mentioned that the media have been manipulated. That is if I heard him correctly; he may correct me if I am wrong. He said, and I wrote it down, that "there has been no escalation in recent months" of military on the borders of Ukraine. He may correct me if I am wrong but he said war is not in Russia's plans, and we welcome that. The ambassador says what is there now is a permanent deployment. Will he give us an idea of what the scale is of the military establishment, if you like, on the borders of Ukraine? We have seen satellite imagery of large troop deployments, tanks, heavy weaponry and so forth. Is that all media manipulation? Is it a mirage? What is going on there, if anything? Will he give us an idea of what is happening? Maybe the Chairman would like to visit and see for himself what is going on, if that is something we could do as a neutral country. In his statement, the ambassador said: "The security situation on the Western borders of Russia is unacceptable and has to be dealt with". Will he say more about what he means by "has to be dealt with"? Later he said: "Let me outline the nature of Russia’s legitimate and reasonable concerns, that are at the heart of our initiative." What "initiative" are we talking about? What did he mean by "at the heart of our initiative"? He did not go on to say what that is, except for criticising NATO and so on. What Russian initiative is he referring to there? I would be interested in that.

Most of the other questions I was going to ask have been answered. Those are just five or six short questions.