The day after I announced that I was stepping down, I was scheduled to come to the Kremlin for an interview with a Japanese reporter. I got a call be… - Mikhail Gorbachev

The reform of our enormous state indeed demanded decentralization and redistribution of powers between the centre and the regions. But the local elites tried to paint this need in the exaggerated colours of 'national survival'. It worked!

"We have retreated from the perennial values. I don't think that we need any new values. The most important thing is to try to revive the universally known values from which we have retreated.
As a young man, I really took to heart the Communist ideals. A young soul certainly cannot reject things like justice and equality. These were the goals proclaimed by the Communists. But in reality that terrible Communist experiment brought about repression of human dignity. Violence was used in order to impose that model on society. In the name of Communism we abandoned basic human values. So when I came to power in Russia I started to restore those values; values of "openness" and freedom."

All members of the world community should resolutely discard old stereotypes and motivations nurtured by the Cold War, and give up the habit of seeking each other's weak spots and exploiting them in their own interests. We have to respect the peculiarities and differences which will always exist, even when human rights and freedoms are observed throughout the world. I keep repeating that with the end of confrontation differences can be made a source of healthy competition, an important factor for progress. This is an incentive to study each other, to engage in exchanges, a prerequisite for the growth of mutual trust. For knowledge and trust are the foundations of a new world order.