Russia, Turkmenistan committed to earlier accords - official.

2/11 Tass 278

MOSCOW, November 2 (Itar-Tass) - Russia and Turkmenistan have
reiterated their commitment to the earlier accords on cooperation in the
fuel and energy sector. First Deputy Prime Minister Viktor Zubkov stated
it after the 5th meeting of the intergovernmental economic cooperation
commission in Ashgabat on Tuesday, the official government website
reported.
"The parties paid special attention to interaction in the fuel and
energy sector. We agreed to act within the framework of the existing
accords in this sphere," Zubkov told reporters.
"Russia and Turkmenistan exchanged views over the key aspects of
bilateral cooperation, in the first place in the trade and economic
sphere. Concrete measures have been taken to create conditions for
stepping up trade since the previous meeting of the intergovernmental
economic cooperation commission.
"Moscow and Ashgabat have created Russian-Turkmen and Turkmen-Russian
trade houses. They will contribute to expanding the range and amount of
supplied goods.
"The Turkmen Russian and Russian-Turkmen business Councils created
under the aegis of the Chambers of Commerce and Industry of the two
countries have been working actively. At their initiative, Ashgabat will
host the 3rd economic forum of Turkmenistan and Russia and Days of
Business Cooperation of Turkmenistan and Russia in 2011. These events will
certainly contribute to further expansion of bilateral trade and economic
interaction.
"At present, Turkmenistan is implementing more than 120 joint projects
and contracts worth 1 billion dollars. They include the projects involving
such Russian companies as Silovye Mashiny, KamAZ, Itera, mobile
Telesystems.
In all, 138 companies with Russian stakes are operating on the Turkmen
market.
"The expansion of interaction in the field of transport certainly
contributes to the strengthening of our trade and economic partnership.
The concrete result of the Tuesday session was the singing of the package
of documents which provides of launching full-fledged railway ferry
between the ports of Makhachkala and Turkmenbashi," Russia's first deputy
premier said.
He gave a high valuation to the positive dynamics of cooperation in
education and science, noting that Turkmenistan had opened the new
building of the Turkmen-Russian schools named after A. Pushkin.
In 2010, the number of grants for Turkmen students in Russian colleges
increased from 275 to 317. A Russian-Turkmen science-innovation forum will
take place in Ashgabat at the initiative of the presidents of the two
countries in 2011.
"On the whole, the meeting of the intergovernmental economic
cooperation commission confirmed the positive dynamics of our bilateral
trade, economic and humanitarian cooperation. Furthermore, a large
accumulated potential has shown itself. I'm confident the work within the
framework of the commission will contribute to its realization next year,"
Zubkov added.
"I wish to note the productiveness of the Tuesday session. The
dialogue was constructive and mutually useful. We carried out a sort of
stock-taking: we summed up the results of the implementation of the
decisions and recommendations of the previous session of the economic
cooperation commission, and mapped out the tasks for the future, which
includes the top-level accords reached in the course of Russian President
Dmitry Medvedev's visit to Turkmenistan on October 21-22, 2010," he said.
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