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RF deputy FM to hand awards to Italians

The ceremony will be held at the residence of the Russian Ambassador to Italy

ROME, February 5 (Itar-Tass) – Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Gennady Gatilov will hand to Italian citizens on Tuesday Russia’s state awards - the Pushkin Orders of Friendship - for outstanding contribution to the development of bilateral relations. The ceremony will be held at the residence of the Russian Ambassador to Italy.

Among the winners of the Order of Friendship award is Gianni Letta, a former Secretary of State for the Italian Council of Ministers, co-chair of the organising committee of the Russia-Italy Cross Culture Year (2011).

Former Minister of Foreign Affairs of Italy Franco Frattini will also be presented with the honorary award. Analysts call him the most likely successor to NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen whose mandate will expire on July 31, 2014.

The Pushkin Medal will be awarded to Mario De Simoni and Emmanuele Francesco Maria Emanuele – Director General and President of Palaexpo. The company participated in the organisation of major exhibitions within the framework of the Cross Culture Year.

The Pushkin Medal will also be awarded to Professor Giuliano Urbani. He was one of the drafters of the program of the Year of Italian Language and Culture in Russia and the Russian Language and Culture in Italy. Within the framework of this initiative, a tour of the Milan Theatre La Scala took place in the Russian Federation. And the Italians got the opportunity to familiarise themselves with the works of famous Russian groups, such as the Igor Moiseyev State Academic Folk Dance Ensemble and the Academic Maly Drama Theatre directed by Lev Dodin.

Tours of the famous St. Petersburg troupe were held in Milan-based Piccolo Theatre. Its Artistic Director Sergio Escobar is among the award winners, the same as the Director of another famous Milanese cultural institution – Brera Art Gallery, Sandrina Bandera. It is in the walls of this museum that keeps outstanding works of art of the XIV-XIX centuries that an exhibition of Impressionists from the collection of the Pushkin State Museum of Fine Arts was held.