President of Russia Vladimir Putin has declared that Russia has become the legal successor of the former USSR and has assumed responsibility for paying the debts of all former Soviet republics for exchange of stocks abroad, but not all re-formed countries have transmitted those stocks to the Russian Federation, reports RIA Novosti.

“The preamble to the current Constitution clearly states that the history spans millennia and that Russia is the legal successor of the former USSR. In any case, everyone agreed that Russia is the legal successor when it was necessary to pay and return the loans of the former Soviet republics. I believe Russia paid 16,000,000 for Ukraine,” Putin said during a meeting with the task force in charge of making amendments to the Russian Constitution and commented on the proposal to enshrine in the Constitution that Russia is the legal successor of the former USSR and the Russian Empire.

The participants of the meeting offered to register the paid debts, but the President disapproved this.