February 07, 2007	Wednesday	Muharram 18, 1428

MOSCOW, Feb 6: President Vladimir Putin told top business leaders on Tuesday that Russia must wean itself off a dependency on exporting raw material and use the country's wealth of natural resources to develop the economy.

Meeting at the Kremlin with 25 major businessmen, Putin said Russia's economy required "qualitative steps away from mere exploitation of natural resources and toward their intensive refinement."

"One of our main, overall economic priorities is becoming the diversification of Russian industry," he said.

The Kremlin has previously expressed concern about the country's over-dependence on commodities and particularly oil, but the warnings have fallen back in the last few months.

—AFP