Russia, India to sign long- term program of scientific cooperation

NEW DELHI, December 15 (Itar-Tass) - Russia and India will sign a
comprehensive long-term program of scientific technical cooperation for a
period until 2020, Russian ambassador to India Alexander Kadakin told
Itar-Tass on Wednesday. The document will be signed in the framework of
President Medvedev's visit to India scheduled for the end of December, the
ambassador added.
Thanks to this program throughout the past decade around 500 joint
projects were fulfilled, and 4,000 scientists exchanged mutual visits,
Kadakin said. The ambassador believes in good prospects for cooperation
between the two countries in the scientific -technical field. Russo-Indian
contacts in this field actually extend from the Earth Bowls to vast space
areas, the ambassador said.
Joint use of the GLONASS satellite navigation system is one of the
main contributions to the development of innovation technologies, Kadakin
said. The matter concerns not only production of ground equipment at
Indian enterprises, but also GLONASS signals Russia is prepared to share
with India, the ambassador said. Russia and India continue cooperation in
other space projects, including training of a new Indian Lunar expedition
and preparation of a new manned space flight, the ambassador said.
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