Together with students of the Nakhimov Military Academy, the Moscow Suvorov Academy and members of youth movements, the head of state laid flowers on the monument to Minin and Pozharskii in the Red Square.
Those present then conversed with the President for a few minutes. Vladimir Putin answered a number of young people's questions about the recently-instituted national holiday, Russia's international role and more personal topics.
After the meeting there was a reception in the Grand Kremlin Palace on the occasion of National Unity Day. At this meeting Vladimir Putin awarded Pushkin medals to six foreign citizens: Viktor Kushnerenko – academic secretary of the A.S. Pushkin house museum in Chisinau, Moldova; Margarita Liubomirova – Russian language expert of the Plovdiv Regional Inspectorate for Education, representative of the Russianists' Society, teacher at the Christ Smirnensky Middle School, Bulgaria; Marietta Mathashian – Director of the A.S. Pushkin Middle School No. 8 in Yerevan, Armenia; Nobuiuki Nakamoto – honourable professor at the Kanagawa University, Japan; Ionel Haiduc – President of the Romanian Academy of Sciences; Natalia Bogdanova – Director of the A.S. Pushkin Museum in the Crimean Republic in Gurzuf, Ukraine.
The reception's guests included the participants in the Russian World Assembly that took place yesterday in Moscow.