Medvedev, King of Spain to start up cross year.

ST. PETERSBURG, February 25 (Itar-Tass) -- Russian President Dmitry
Medvedev and King of Spain Juan Carlos I will launch the cross-year of
Spain and Russia in the second biggest Russian city on Friday by opening
the Prado in the Hermitage exhibition.
The cross-year includes tours of the Bolshoi and Mariinsky Theaters
and of the National Philharmonic Orchestra in Spain and visits of the
National Ballet of Spain and Spanish National Classic Theater to Russia.
Late on Thursday the Russian president and the King of Spain had an
informal dinner to discuss bilateral cooperation and the situation in the
Middle East.
The cross-year will end with a gala concert in Madrid on December 5,
2011 when the Russian president is expected to visit Spain.


.Medvedev to meet Armenian president.

ST. PETERSBURG, February 25 (Itar-Tass) -- Russian President Dmitry
Medvedev will meet his Armenian counterpart Serzh Sargsyan on Friday on
the eve of Azeri-Armenian summit talks on Nagorno-Karabakh scheduled in
Sochi next weekend.
Sargsyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev are to hold a regular
round of direct talks in the Black Sea spa on March 5.
Nagorno-Karabakh settlement means "stability in the Caucasus, calm and
return to a normal life of the close neighbors. It is a very noble and
important aim and we shall spare no effort to achieve it," a Kremlin
official said.

.Medvedev submits Bali treaty protocol for ratification.

MOSCOW, February 25 (Itar-Tass) -- President Dmitry Medvedev submitted
the third protocol to the Bali Treaty for ratification in the State Duma
on Thursday which would allow the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO)
to join ASEAN as an entity.
The protocol was signed last year in Hanoi and Russian Foreign
Minister Sergei Lavrov said it allows international organizations to join
the treaty.
"Our partners displayed interest in establishing close relations
between ASEAN and SCO. We discussed concrete plans in this connection. We
shall work them out and implement," he said and recalled an ASEAN deputy
general had attended the latest SCO summit.
The Treaty of Amity and Cooperation in Southeast Asia signed in Bali
in 1976 by ASEAN founders stipulates such principles as respect for
independence, sovereignty, equality, territorial integrity, and peaceful
settlement of conflicts. Besides ten ASEAN members participants in the
treaty currently comprise 16 other countries, including Russia, China, and
India.

.Duma to ratify Afghan air transit agreement with USA.

MOSCOW, February 25 (Itar-Tass) -- The Russian State Duma will on
Friday consider the ratification of the agreement with the United States
on air transit of military cargoes to Afghanistan.
The document provides a legal basis according to UN Security Council
resolutions for air transit of weapons, military hardware and property, as
well as US servicemen for participation in operations carried out by the
International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan.
Russia charges no air navigation duties on the flights which is its
contribution to the international effort to stabilize the situation in
Afghanistan.
However Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said Russia retains the
right to land any aircraft on its territory to verify whether its cargo
corresponds to the declared one.
"We have the right to ask any flight to land in Russia to verify
compliance of the declared cargo with what it has on board in reality,"
the minister said soon after the agreement was signed in 2009.

.Downtown London to erect monument to first man in space.

LONDON, February 25 (Itar-Tass) -- To commemorate the first manned
flight into space which took place fifty years ago London will erect a
monument to Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin who blasted off on April 12,
1961.
"The monument will be erected in downtown London," a representative of
the British Council told Tass on Thursday adding all details are kept in
secret and will be disclosed only in mid-March when London will officially
announce plans to commemorate the first man in space.
Earlier Britain's Minister of State for Universities and Science David
Willetts said the monument to Yuri Gagarin will be erected in downtown
London in July. Willets made the statement after signing an agreement with
the Russian Federal Space Agency Roscosmos in Moscow on holding the
Russian-British Year of Space in 2011.
He said the statue will be built in front of a monument to British
explorer and navigator James Cook.
Gagarin visited the United Kingdom in July 1961.
The first man in space was killed in a plane crash during a routine
flight in a MiG fighter in 1968.
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