MOSCOW, October 2. /TASS/. Latin American countries understand the necessity of de-dollarization of economic relations with Russia, Director of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Latin American Department Alexander Shchetinin told TASS on the sidelines of the Russia-Latin America conference, adding that the parties are working on the shift to national currencies in mutual settlements.
"Our Central Bank is involved in this work. We are seeking to shift to national currencies where it is possible since this is obviously a comprehensive problem. This is not only an issue of political solutions, this is also an issue of the balance of trading volume. So respective work is underway, though a large group of [Latin American] countries obviously understand the necessity of de-dollarization of our foreign economic ties," he explained.
"Further on this is a task for experts, specialists to turn it into reality," Shchetinin added.
The first international parliamentary conference Russia-Latin America is taking place in Moscow from September 19 to October 2 at the Russian State Duma’s (lower house of the parliament) initiative. Parliamentarians from Latin American and the Caribbean countries, representatives of the expert community, public figures and diplomats are discussing relevant issues of the global parliamentary agenda with Russian colleagues.