普京提醒俄罗斯人要进一步勒紧裤腰带
Vladimir Putin has put Russians on notice for a long winter, warning of extended economic weakness and the need for further belt-tightening.
俄罗斯总统弗拉基米尔渠京(Vladimir Putin)提醒俄罗斯人准备度过一个漫长的冬天，他警告称，俄罗斯的经济疲软仍将持续一段时间，人们需要进一步勒紧裤腰带。
“The Russian economy has passed the peak of the crisis — not the crisis, but the peak of the crisis,” Mr Putin told hundreds of reporters on Thursday, in a marked departure from his earlier insistence that the country — while facing difficulties — was not in crisis.
普京周四对数百名记者表示：“俄罗斯经济已经度过了危机的高峰期——不是度过了危机，而是度过了危机的高峰期。”这一言论明显有别于他此前坚持的说法，即俄罗斯虽然面临着困难，但并没有陷入危机。
The Russian president delivered his assessment during a wide-ranging, end-of-year press conference that featured a burst of admiration for Donald Trump and another slap at Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
普京在这次年度记者会上对诸多领域的问题发表了评论。值得一提的是，他对唐纳德礠朗普(Donald Trump)大加赞赏，对土耳其总统雷杰普吠伊普埃尔多安(Recep Tayyip Erdogan)则又作了番嘲讽。
Calling the Republican presidential hopeful “flamboyant” and “very talented”, Mr Putin said of Mr Trump: “He is an absolute leader of the presidential race as we see it today. He says he wants to take relations with Russia to another level, a more thorough level. How can we not welcome that?”
普京称特朗普“光彩夺目”且“很有才华”。他在提及这位共和党总统候选人时表示：“在我们当前看到的这场总统竞选中，他处于绝对领先地位。他说他想将美俄关系带入另一个层次，一个更加深入的层次。我们怎么可能不欢迎这样的提议？”
By contrast, he escalated a brawl with Mr Erdogan begun last month when the Turkish military shot down a Russian bomber at the border with Syria.
与之形成对比的是，他用更高的调门抨击了埃尔多安。上月，土耳其军方在土叙边境击落了一架俄罗斯战斗轰炸机，两国领导人因此爆发口角。
“In the past Turkey still flew there and violated Syrian airspace all the time, now let them try to fly there!” he threatened, mentioning Russia’s recent deployment of S-400 air defence systems to Syria. “If someone in the Turkish leadership decided to kiss the Americans on a certain body part — I don’t know if they succeeded,” he added, noting that he saw no hope for repairing relations with the government in Ankara.
普京威胁道：“过去，土耳其的飞机仍会飞到那儿、不断侵犯叙利亚领空，现在他们再飞到那儿试试！”他这里指的是俄近期在叙利亚部署了S-400防空系统。普京表示：“如果土耳其的某个领导人决定要亲吻美国人身上的某个部位，我不知道他是否能成功。”普京指出，他看不到任何与土耳其政府修复关系的希望。
Mr Putin also offered a surprise admission that Russian special forces had been in eastern Ukraine, telling a Ukrainian journalist: “We never said that there are no people who deal with the resolution of certain problems there, including in the military sphere, but that doesn’t mean that there are regular Russian troops there. Feel the difference.”
普京还令人意外地承认，俄特种部队曾进入乌克兰东部。他对乌克兰记者说：“我们从没说过没人去那里努力解决特定的问题，包括军事领域的，但这并不意味着那里有俄罗斯正规军。体会下其中的差异吧。”
But apart from these digressions, the Russian leader kept the agenda focused on economic matters. The news was mostly bad.
不过，除了这些题外话，普京始终还是把议程的重点放在了经济事务上。在这方面，他给出的信息大多比较令人郁闷。
The government’s budget for next year, adopted by parliament only at the beginning of this month, would need to be adjusted to reflect the latest drop in oil prices, he warned.
俄罗斯国会在本月初才通过了政府明年的财政预算，而普京却警告说，这份预算需要调整，以反映油价的最新下跌。
“We calculated the budget for next year from these figures. That is a very optimistic assessment — $50 per barrel. But where does it stand now already — $38? Therefore, we will probably be forced to correct something here,” Mr Putin said.
他说：“我们是基于这样的数字编制明年的预算的，这是一个非常乐观的估算数字，每桶50美。但现在油价已到了多少，每桶38美元？因此，我们很可能要被迫作些调整。”
Reversing a longstanding refusal to consider raising the country’s pension age, Mr Putin said: “If we don’t react, the inflows of the pension system will shrink. There is already a deficit in the pension system, and we need to refinance that deficit from the budget. Decisions have to be taken in due course to ensure that we don’t destroy the pension system in five, 10 or 15 years.”
普京长期以来一直拒绝考虑提高俄罗斯养老金的领取年龄，他这次转变立场称：“如果我们不采取应对措施，养老金体系的资金流入将会萎缩。目前养老金体系已然存在赤字，我们需要从预算中找钱来填补这一赤字。我们必须在适当的时候作出决策，以确保我们不会在未来5年、10年或15年毁掉养老金体系。”
The remarks follow frequent warnings from economic advisers such as Alexei Kudrin, the former finance minister, who said a stagnating population and dwindling economic growth means Moscow needs to address pension and other long-delayed structural reforms.
在普京发表这些言论前，包括俄罗斯前财长阿列克谢錠德林(Alexei Kudrin)在内的经济顾问已频繁发出警告。库德林曾表示，俄罗斯增长陷于停滞的人口和不断下滑的经济增长意味着，俄政府必须着手实施养老金改革和其他拖延已久的结构性改革。
Hit by sliding oil prices and western sanctions, Russia’s economy is forecast to contract 3.7 per cent this year. While the slide in industrial production and investment is slowing, the drop in retail sales extended to minus 13.1 per cent last month, according to data published on Thursday.
在油价下滑和西方制裁的打击下，今年俄经济预计会萎缩3.7%。根据周四发布的数据，尽管工业生产和投资的下滑正在放缓，但零售额的下滑幅度却在上月扩大至13.1%。
Although the government expects gross domestic product to return to 0.7 growth in 2016, the central bank has said the country has the potential to grow little more than 2 per cent a year in the medium term. Real household incomes are expected to fall at least 5 per cent this year — the first such drop in Mr Putin’s 16 years in power.
今年，俄罗斯实际家庭收入预计会下降至少5%——这是普京掌权的16年里首次出现如此幅度的下降。
While Mr Putin’s support ratings continue to stand at record highs above 80 per cent, polls reflect deepening dissatisfaction over the economy. In a rare sign of open discontent, truck drivers from several Russian regions have been protesting against a new electronic toll system for more than six weeks.
普京的支持率仍高于80%，处于创纪录高点，但民调结果显示，俄民众对俄经济形势的不满正在加深。6周多来，俄多个地区的卡车司机一直在抗议新的电子收费系统，这是一个罕见的、俄民众公开表达不满的迹象。
Mr Putin addressed their concerns on Thursday but offered little relief. He insisted that heavy trucks must pay for road usage to help finance infrastructure investment, and force small transport entrepreneurs out of the grey economy. “But we must help them,” he said, adding that the government might abolish an existing transport tax to reduce the sector’s financial burden.
周四，普京针对这些人的顾虑作了回应，但没有给他们带来多少安慰。普京坚称，重型卡车必须支付道路使用费，以帮助筹措基础建设投资所需的资金，并将小型运输企业挤出这一灰色经济。“但我们必须帮助他们，”普京表示。他还说，俄政府可能会废除现有的运输税，以减轻该行业的经济负担。
In keeping with the sober mood, Mr Putin cut down on the banter with journalists from far-flung regions that had become the event’s trademark. A session that once sprawled to a record 4.5 hours was wrapped up in a mere three.
在以往的年度记者会上，普京会与来自五湖四海的记者打趣，这已成为这项活动的标志。为确保本次记者会处于一种严肃的氛围下，普京减少了与记者间的打趣。这个以往曾拖沓到创纪录的4个半小时的记者会，这次只耗时3小时就结束了。
Still, Mr Putin indulged their questions about Mr Trump and other colourful personalities. Ever the provocateur, he volunteered that embattled Fifa chief Sepp Blatter should be given the Nobel Prize as “his contribution to the global humanitarian sphere is colossal”.
不过，普京仍然如记者们所愿回答了他们提出的有关特朗普和其他形形色色的人物的问题。一向不怕惹事的普京，还主动提议应授予陷入麻烦的国际足联(Fifa)主席塞普布拉特(Sepp Blatter)诺贝尔奖(Nobel Prize)，理由是“他对全球人道主义领域作出了巨大的贡献”。
