Ecuador's vice-president leaves for visit to Russia.

BOGOTA, September 14 (Itar-Tass) -- Vice-President of Ecuador Lenin
Moreno on Monday set off for a visit to Russia, which will last till
September 17, the vice-president's press service reported.
During his stay in Russia, Moreno plans to visit Moscow and St.
Petersburg to hold talks with Russian importers to let them know of the
advantages of Ecuadorian-made products. As he said before the departure,
Russia is one of major export destinations for Ecuadorian flowers, bananas
and cacao.
The program of the visit also includes meetings with men of arts to
promote bilateral cultural cooperation. Of special interest, Moreno said,
is the practices of Russian circus schools that might be used to create a
similar school for the disabled and orphans in Ecuador. "We want to set up
several such schools in different cities (Quito, Guayaquil, and Cuenca) to
support such population categories," he noted.
Moreno has used a wheelchair since taking a gunshot to the back in a
1998 robbery attempt.

.Russian president marks his 45th birthday.

MOSCOW, September 14 (Itar-Tass) -- Russian President Dmitry Medvedev
on Tuesday marks his 45th birthday, the third one in the presidential
office.
"Dmitry Medvedev will celebrate his birthday with his family in
Sochi," where he is currently on a working visit, the Kremlin press
service told Itar-Tass. "The president's working schedule for today
includes no public events."
The president once confessed he preferred to mark such events in the
family circle. "It is a family holiday," Medvedev said in an interview
back in 2008. "Due to my work, I have little time to spend with my family,
and it will be a good pretext to gather together."
Dmitry Medvedev was born on September 14, 1965 in Russia's second
largest city of Leningrad (now St. Petersburg). He graduated from the
department of law of the Leningrad State University, followed by a
post-graduate course. In 1990-1998 he was lecturer at this university and
concurrently was adviser to chairman of the Leningrad City Council and
expert of St. Petersburg Mayor's Office committee for foreign ties.
When he was 34, Medvedev was appointed deputy head of the Russian
government's administration, and then was appointed deputy and first
deputy head of the Kremlin administration. In October 2003, he became the
Russian president's administration head.
Two years later, he was appointed first deputy prime minister, and was
elected Russian president in March 2008, when he was 42, to be Russia's
youngest head of state in the past 100 years. He is among the world's five
youngest leaders. All CIS presidents are at least eight years his senior,
and among G8 and G20 leaders, only Britain's Premier David Cameron is one
year his junior.

.Kazakhstan president arrives on two-day official visit to Ukraine.

KIEV, September 14 (Itar-Tass) -- President of Kazakhstan Nursultan
Nazarbayev on Tuesday arrives in Kiev on a two-day official visit, the
press service of the Ukrainian head of state told Itar-Tass.
According to the press service, the visiting Kazakh president is
expected to sign a number of cooperation agreements, including the ones on
cooperation in the areas of space, science and education.
Nazarbayev will meet with his Ukrainian counterpart Viktor Yanukovich
in a narrow format in the first half of the day, and then the talks will
be expanded to involve the two countries' delegations.
In the second half of the day, Nazarbayev is expected to attend a
business forum involving representatives of big businesses and state-run
companies from the two countries to discuss measures to enliven investment
cooperation. The forum will be attended by Ukraine's Prime Minister
Nikolai Azarov.
The sides had previously agreed that by Nazarbayev's visit to Kiev the
two countries' ministries of economics, industrial policy, and fuel and
energy would draft a number of cooperation proposals on investment
projects. According to Ukraine's government sources, the current
cooperation level between Ukraine and Kazakhstan meets neither society's
requirements nor their economic potentials.
According to the Ukrainian statistics committee, Ukrainian exports to
Kazakhstan amounted to 700 million U.S. dollars in January-July 2010,
which was 23 percent less than in the same period of 2009. Kazakhstan
comes third among CIS countries after Russia and Belarus in terms of
Ukrainian exports.
Kazakhstan's exports to Ukraine dropped by 76 percent in the first
seven months of 2010 and reached only 383 million U.S. dollars. The drop
resulted from the change of Kazakhstan's oil supplies routes at the
beginning of the current year.
According to an Itar-Tass correspondent in Astana, the two presidents
will discuss issues of Kazakh-Ukrainian cooperation both in bilateral and
multi-lateral formats, and will sign a number of bilateral documents.
According to both foreign ministries, regular exchange of visits by
the Kazakh and Ukrainian presidents testify to their commitment to boost
bilateral relations. This spring, the two heads of state signed a next,
third, roadmap for cooperation between the Ukraine and Kazakhstan for
2010-2011.
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