The Bank of Russia insisted the decision to cut the base rate by 25 basis points to 14% last month was its own. "The president used to refrain from commenting on the central bank, but now he has started doing so," said Oleg Vyugin, a former first deputy governor of the Bank of Russia. Together, those factors have increased the pressure on the central bank." Nabiullina has accepted that the central bank can temporarily show greater flexibility in pursuing its long-standing 4% inflation target, though there's no formal agreement to that effect, according to a person close to the government. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov and the Bank of Russia didn't immediately respond to requests for comment.