SIMFEROPOL, March 31. /ITAR-TASS/. Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has arrived in Simferopol in the highest-level visit since Crimea's accession to the Russian Federation.

Medvedev will chair a session on social and economic development of Crimea and Sevastopol.

The government press service said the session also planned to discuss the execution of instructions given at a Cabinet session on March 24 on assistance to the two new entities of the Russian Federation.

The delegation includes First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov and Medvedev deputies Dmitry Kozak, Sergey Prikhodko, Olga Golodets, Arkady Dvorkovich, Dmitry Rogozin, Yuri Trutnev and Alexander Khloponin alongside federal ministers and heads of relevant agencies.

Last week, Medvedev issued a host of tasks to ministries and departments, aimed at assistance to Crimea and Sevastopol in economic development and a better social standing for their residents.

The Finance and Labour ministries received instructions to prepare a plan for staged increases of salaries for public sector workers to raise them to the level of those in Russia.

Russia'a government is also working on a new targeted federal programme for social and economic development of the region's new entities until 2020.

Another instruction from the prime minister concerns proposals to set up a special economic zone. The Finance Ministry and the Ministry for Economic Development, working with the Bank of Russia, must submit to the Cabinet a "road map" ensuring stable functioning of the banking and payment systems and safety of the population's financial assets taking account of the switch to the Russian ruble.

The prime minister has also asked ministries to develop proposals within a week on increasing the number of flights to Crimea and Sevastopol, subsidized from the federal budget.