Russian Deputy PM to arrive in New Delhi

Moscow, Nov 8 : Russian Deputy Prime Minister Sergei Sobyanin will arrive in New Delhi today for a four-day visit to prepare for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s official visit to Moscow, next month.

The official part of Mr Sobyanin’s visit will start from tomorrow, during which he will meet Dr Singh.

He is also expected to discuss joint efforts against terrorism and drug trafficking, as well as cooperation in international affairs with Minister of External Affairs S M Krishna.

Mr Sobyanin, a close ally of Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, cochairs Indo-Russian Inter-Governmental Commission on Trade, Economic, Scientific, Technological and Cultural Cooperation (IRIGC) with Mr Krishna, who visited Moscow last month for the 15th session of the IRIGC.

Cooperation in the oil and gas sphere will also be on Mr Sobyanin’s agenda in New Delhi during his talks with Union Petroleum and Natural Gas Minister Murli Deora.

The Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) is currently taking part in Sakhalin-I. It is also the owner, via subsidiary ONGC Videsh Ltd (OVL), of British oil company Imperial Energy with production licences for fields in west Siberia's Tomsk Region.

Mr Sobyanin is also scheduled to meet Commerce and Industry Minister Anand Sharma to discuss the ambitious goal of increasing bilateral trade, which is expected to total seven billion dollar in 2009, to 20 billion dollar by 2015.

He would also visit the Kudankulam nuclear power plant in Tamil Nadu where Atomstroyexport, Russia's nuclear power equipment and service export monopoly, has been building two reactors for the plant since 2002 in line with a 1988 deal between India and the Soviet Union and an addendum signed 10 years later.

The launch of the power plant is scheduled for the first half of 2010.

--UNI

(c) 2009 Published with permission from United News of India.
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