announcer: at the 2018 st. petersburg international economic forum, an unprecedented summit took place on stage with some of the world's most powerful leaders in politics and finance taking questions directly from bloomberg's top editor. ms. lagarde: when we decide to rebuild, we need to be really careful as to the transparency and the actual impact. prime minister abe: dialogue for the sake of dialogue is pointless. dialogue needs to lead to action. president putin: trust -- it is either there or not. if there is no trust, nothing good will come out of it. ♪ announcer: coming up, an hour of conversation from this presidential plenary panel.

but first, the session's moderator, john mickelthwait, sets the scene. john: trust was the theme in st. petersburg -- or perhaps the lack of it. with the prospect of a global trade war, with all the problems to do with iran, the issues to do with north korea, there is not a lot of trust on the international stage. i am john mickelthwait, the editor-in-chief of bloomberg and i came to st. petersburg to sit down with vladimir putin of russia, emmanuel macron of france, shinzo abe of japan, wang qishan, vice president of china, and christine lagarde with the imf to discuss these issues. i began by asking vladimir putin what he would do to salvage the iran nuclear accord. we all know you want to keep the deal, you say you are a man of action. what actions will you take to

keep the iranian nuclear deal alive now? president putin: the so-called iranian nuclear deal has been established by a respective un security council and that is a multilateral, international legal document and it warrants our actions to be predictable. we need to adhere to the common rules. any unilateral action leads into a dead end and is always counterproductive. that is why all of us together, all of the participants of this process should stick to charter sincerely and move forward with resolutions. we discussed this issue with president macron and an idea came to our mind. every four years, presidential elections take place in the united states. so if international legal treaties and documents are being signed every three or four,

maximum four years, they will be rethought. so what will be the timeframe for planning if one follows this particular regime? it will be zero, which will lead to an environment wrought with mistrust and nervousness, and so if we trade what we agreed upon with true sincerity, that would lead to reliability and predictability. john: during the previous sanctions regimes, russia supported the sanctions against iran, and you followed the rules. this time, you disagree with what has happened. if themericans impose sanctions on iran selling oil, will you buy the oil in exchange for wheat or something like that and allow iran to get around the deal? president putin: it is a very simple question to me.

we do not buy oil at all. we produce and sell it ourselves. we are the biggest supplier of oil on the global market. as far as sanctions are concerned, russia supported sanctions on iran, the sanctions which were adopted by the security council of the united nations and never supported anything that has been enforced by anybody unilaterally. this is something i have been always talking about. i believe to be counterproductive, damaging, and detrimental. experts here as well as in the west, a speech in 2005 in munich, when i was speaking about the ability to attribute x territorial nature to the legal names that are defined as a single state. in that case, the united states. many took offense with me in the united states and europe. but that is something i was warning people about.

now it is flourishing. look at it. john: so here you are. [indiscernible] president putin: if we are attentive in our analysis of what is taking place and to respond on a timely basis, there would be fewer problems like that. we have been supporting everything that has been produced by the global community to convince the iranian counterparts to reach the well-known terms of agreements and you should commend them, they went through a lot of compromises, and they are very true to all of their commitments. very recently, i met with the head of the international atomic agency. a very reputable organization and a very respectful person who we all trust. yet ain, he told me that based

on the data they have, iran completely stands up to all of the commitments that they took. what is it we should punish them for? i do not understand it. this is the first part. the second thing is what will happen if this whole deal is devastated? would it be beneficial to anyone, will it be good for the global community, for the future of the regions? will the regional countries, including israel, feel safe? the country that we have good relations with. president netanyahu came to moscow and participated in the victory day events. there is a photograph he took with one of the second world war veterans and heroes passing through the square with us. that was a unique gesture demonstrating very credible, trustworthy relations between us. is it going to be good for this

country if iran is pushed out of this treaty because the nuclear activities by iran would be something that no one would be able to understand. what kind of risk should ensue? will we be able to sort things t in north korea? there is a problem upon a problem upon a problem. nothing has been regulated. do we want to now produce the second problem of the same nature? the hotspot that we remember it could be. so we should very calmly in a very good-natured, professional way maintain this dialogue and find a resolution. as far as sanctions are concerned, i have already mentioned it, they have always been supportive of the legitimate tactics of the un security council and have never supported anything that is being unilaterally forced on everyone else. announcer: coming up, more special coverage from the st. petersburg international economic forum. france's emmanuel macron discusses the challenges of staying on the same page with u.s. president donald trump.

president macron: there are things that tie us very closely to the united states and as far as the security is concerned, i enjoy these close relationships very much. but there are certain topics where we do not see eye to eye. ♪

announcer: welcome back to the 2018 st. petersburg international economic forum, where five of the world's most influential leaders came together for a panel moderated by bloomberg editor-in-chief john mickelthwait. the discussion turned to a sixth leader, u.s. president donald trump. john: you are trying to persuade donald trump to not junk the deal, you tried to persuade him not to quit the climate deal, not to start a trade war, not to move the embassy in israel to jerusalem. you tried to do all these things. you tried to softly, softly

approach and it has not worked. do you now think you should argue with trump, mr. trump in a much harder way? president macron: i made an attempt, i tried. i continuously worked on that because that is my responsibility, considering the level of confidence i have. i believe i would have been reprimanded if i did not put all my energy into trying to avoid this particular outcome. and i believe fully in the french foreign policy, which is based upon independence. i understand quite well there are things that really tie us very closely with the united states specifically, as far as the foreign security is concerned. i indeed enjoy these close relationships, but there are certain topics were we do not see eye to eye. we do not stick to the same position all the time. there is also friendship thanks to our history and our past, but there are certain things as well we disagree with.

like with the climate or the nuclear deal. i was not able to convince president trump not to withdraw. he made this promise during his election campaign. i believe that the collective modernization -- we tried to pull together. and in this since i would like to extend my gratefulness to china and president xi jinping , who felt the need to act so no one else gave up on this agreement. the speed of the ratification process speaks volumes. internationally, president trump lost out on this that because he could not do anything in a sense that no one followed him in what he was trying to do. we need to really uphold that. and we are not yet reaching up the level that we need to reach up to, because we are not sufficiently quickly reducing co2 emissions. that is our responsibility and the responsibility of the united states. second point, jerusalem. i openly stated that was an

erroneous decision. i do not think we need to destabilize the situation which is relyi upon clearly set forth principles and certain balances. i naturally support the decision related to them being two states, because france has always adhered to that. one should not forget about the people living there and we need to continue negotiations. they have to be two states which would have its own capital cities, the borders, which would be recognized and could exist in peace. so the decision to move the embassy was not a very correct one. not a very desirable decision. we do regret this and remember the kind of events which occurred after the embassy was inaugurated in jerusalem. and we understand that this has brought about an escalation of various activities.

certainly, in this sense, hamas also should be held responsible. but would like to welcome president abbas' resolute decision. however, several people died because of the conflict, the border conflict with hamas' involvement. i tried to convince president trump with respect to iran, and i tried to convince him and was standing by, and i was saying that we have signed this treaty within the multilevel framework. i believe that this particular approach allows for a certain openness and president trump acknowledged the openness. we are talking about the openness were we could move toward a different set of terms. i believe president trump gave up on the treaty because it was signed by his predecessor. it was "bad" in his understanding by default. now it seems to me we are enjoying support and setting up a coalition and we will be able to set forth the kind of

conditions whereby there will not be an improper escalation. president putin reminded us when he was speaking about the visit by the israeli prime minister to russia. so now we need to further continue our discussions and convince the u.s. to go back into the discussion. because, we are not giving up, but because we are responding to a very legitimate concern on the part of israel and saudi arabia and, to a larger extent, we are thinking about the need to stabilize the whole region. so i believe the kind of dialogue that i had with president trump was very necessary, but it enabled to open up to move forward. of course, this is very important, the effort to try and convince. there is friendship on the one hand, and an alliance on the

other hand which is necessary and one we need to combat terrorism. i will continue this because that is my duty. announcer: up next, japan's prime minister and china's vice president discuss north korea and the potential for a breakthrough if the summit comes to pass. vice president qishan: china hopes for peace and stability on the korean peninsula. under no circumstances should we allow a war. ♪

announcer: let's rejoin the presidential plenary of the 2018 st. petersburg international economic forum, where the panel took up the topic of north korea.

john: prime minister abe and vice president wang qishan, we have the issue of america, north korea and the talks. yesterday donald trump said the talks are off, and now maybe he is saying they could come back on. i wanted to ask both of you who you thought was more to blame for the fact that the talks might not go ahead. is it north korea or is it donald trump for pulling back? prime minister abe: as for the summit between north korea and the u.s., it was an event. we were looking forward to this as the task given and the un security council resolution. the issue of wmds, ballistic missiles, all of these have to

be effectively eliminated and that was the main goal of the summit between the u.s. and north korea. and through holding such a summit, we should advance the resolution of these issues. and as i said, we, japan and north korea, have this issue of enforced disappearance. many japanese girls around 13 years old disappeared. they were kidnapped. in 2002, kim jong-un recognized the fact of kidnapping of japanese girls. and these issues have to be given a comprehensive resolution. dialogue for the sake of dialogue is pointless. dialogue needs to lead to action.

and this was the path we were following. there were many issues, but as for the summit between north korea and the u.s. for the future, we have to do everything to ensure the summit between north korea and the u.s. to that end, the issues that have piled up have to be resolved. kim jong-un published statements saying that he will try to find an opportunity to organize such a summit between the two countries. others should also put their efforts together, such countries as the permanent members of the un security council -- france,

russia, and the other members of the un security council, all of them have to work together so as to implement the u.n. resolution to force north korea to do that as well. the most important thing is to continue with our efforts. north korea should be able to take complete action. and i do hope that concrete actions will be made. by all the participants, a including north korea. as for sanctions, there is a trend as trying to find, get a way out of sanctions to do that. japan is trying to counter that. i do hope we will be able to a a

-- to prevail over these efforts. john: do you have an approach from china's side about the answer to this problem? vice president qishan: before coming here, when i watched as a -- watched television and the internet, i saw the nein that representatives of the chinese foreign ministry have expressed the position of the chinese government on the cancellation of the summit between north korea and the u.s. but you ask this question, i have to tell you that the nuclear issue of the korean peninsula has a bearing on china's core interests. china hopes for peace and stability in the korean

peninsula. under no circumstances should we allow it or were any clashes to happen in this peninsula. that is why we should promote the denuclearization of the korean peninsula and we adhere to a very determined, decisive position on that matter. yesterday, i read some news. despite the statement of or the statement of north korea, both sides still leave some maneuver for a discussion. so i am confident that peace and stability in the korean peninsula have to be maintained.

it is between north korea and the u.s. right now. and a summit is needed. i often believe to achieve the best results, you have to wait for a long time. but in order to sell it -- to settle this as you -- in order to settle this issue i believe , we have to be full of hope, and hope is the theme of this forum. john: do you have any advice for the world in terms of how to deal with president trump? because you, as somebody who is associated with the election of president trump, and you look to and see what has happened, there are many people here under sanctions. he has just withdrawn from the a -- the iran deal. there are doubts about the north korean deal. what do you think you have got from the relationship with him? the same question i asked mr. macron?

president putin: he is a provocateur. certainly, we cannot be satisfied with the current level and the nature of the american-russian relations and we are willing to engage in this dialogue. mr. trump has suggested a separate meeting should be held. so far, we didn't manage to work it out yet because many issues are popping up. but we are willing to have this conversation, a substantial one, i think. it is high time we engaged in a multilateral approach like that on many domains. donald trump has expressed concerns about a new arms race and i concur with him fully. the measures we are talking about with north korea, iran, they are not bringing us together. but that is another reason to talk about these matters. emmanuel has said that europe and the u.s. have mutual obligations, europe is dependent on the u.s. in terms of security, but one should not be

alarmed. we will help. we will help ensure that security. and in any case, we are doing everything in our power as to avoid anthreats. i think this is the avenue we should be pursuing. that is the first thing. secondly, i will enter into a sort of discussion with the president of france, who said donald trump lost because he pulled out from the iranian deal. i do not think he lost, first and foremost. he is just doing good on his electoral promises. and in that sense, he is a victor domestically. should this deal be demolished for good, then many will stand to lose. announcer: straight ahead, frank talk about economic sanctions. are they still effective?

>> the russian economy is evidently stable, despite the triple and double shocks related to the price decline. so it all came to a point. some were able to persevere. ♪

♪ announcer: welcome back to the presidential plenary of the 2018 st. petersburg international economic forum. building a trust economy was the central theme of the conference. russia's vladimir putin and france's emmanuel macron engaged directly on the issue of how to foster trust to build cooperation and to maintain global security. president macron: i would like to assure vladimir that i am not afraid at all. i have some obligations, commitments with regards to our european allies. i believe the current