The Yaroslavl World Political Forum, “Modern State: Democratic Standards and Efficiency Criteria”, is over with a plenary meeting attended by President Dmitry Medvedev. More than 500 statesmen, politicians and experts from 35 countries took part in the event.

Medvedev, the forum patron, spent over four hours with the delegates, including a 35-minute speech he gave at the plenary meeting.

Other speakers were South Korean President Lee Myung-bak and Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi. Medvedev had an informal discussion with political experts in the morning and made a program speech to define five universal democratic standards in the afternoon.

This is only the second forum of the series but foreign experts have already called it ‘Russian Davos.’