MOSCOW, November 26. /TASS/. Russia and Kazakhstan will sign 20 joint documents following the upcoming state visit of Russian President Vladimir Putin to Astana on November 27-28, Kremlin Aide Yury Ushakov told reporters.
"An impressive package of 20 documents is ready for signing. These are intergovernmental, interdepartmental documents and commercial documents. They cover literally all the most important areas of our bilateral cooperation: from energy, transport to healthcare and justice," Ushakov said.
"This was an initiative of the Kazakh side. We deliberately thought it out in such a way as to time the visit with the summit of CSTO (Collective Security Treaty Organization - TASS), which will also be held in the capital of Kazakhstan, Astana, on November 28," he added.
As the Russian President's aide noted, the very fact of the state visit underlines the successful development of bilateral relations.
"Last year, trade turnover between Russia and Kazakhstan set a new record and came close to $30 billion. In 2023, mutual trade grew to a record $28.4 billion. Over the first 9 months of this year, this figure amounted to $20.6 billion. Moreover, the share of national currencies in mutual settlements is almost 90%," he said.
As Ushakov noted, Russia is one of the largest investors in the economy of Kazakhstan. The total volume of accumulated Russian capital investments is about $13 billion. There are more than 23,000 business structures with Russian participation in the republic and more than 60 large joint projects are being implemented in all key sectors of the Kazakh economy.
"The Russian language is widely and freely used in Kazakhstan, we appreciate this and are grateful to the President of Kazakhstan [Kassym-Jomart Tokayev] for his initiative to establish an international organization for the Russian language. The activities of this organization will help support the promotion of the Russian language as a means of interstate and interethnic communication," Ushakov noted.
Visit’s agenda
He said that this will be the sixth personal meeting of the heads of state this year. As part of the state visit, talks at the highest level will first be held in a narrow format, and then in an expanded format.
"A wide range of issues of bilateral cooperation in the political, economic, humanitarian spheres, as well as the most pressing regional and international problems will be discussed," the Russian presidential aide added.
After the talks, the leaders of the two countries will take part in a plenary session of the 20th anniversary forum of interregional cooperation between Russia and Kazakhstan via video link, which is being held on November 26-27 in Ufa. Also, in a video conference mode, the leaders of the two countries will take part in the opening of a branch of the Kazakh National University named after Al-Farabi at the Dostoevsky Omsk University.
"The leaders of the two countries will launch the work of this branch," Ushakov said.
Russian delegation
The Russian delegation includes Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Deputy Prime Ministers Alexander Novak and Alexey Overchuk, Justice Minister Konstantin Chuychenko, and Minister of Industry and Trade Anton Alikhanov. The negotiations will also be attended by Health Minister Mikhail Murashko, Economic Development Minister Maxim Reshetnikov, Transport Minister Roman Starovoit, Construction and Housing and Utilities Minister Irek Faizullin, Energy Minister Sergey Tsivilev, Director of the Federal Service for Military-Technical Cooperation Dmitry Shugaev, and head of the Russian Federal State Agency for Health and Consumer Rights Anna Popova. The delegation also included CEO and Chairman of the Board of JSC Russian Railways Oleg Belozerov, CEO of Roscosmos Yury Borisov, as well as head of the Russian Direct Investment Fund Kirill Dmitriev, VTB CEO Andrey Kostin, Rosatom CEO Alexey Likhachev and head of the Russian Export Center Veronika Nikishina.