The agenda of the Meeting of the SCO Council of Heads of Government includes the development of trade, economic and humanitarian cooperation within the organisation. The heads of delegations of India, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, China, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan will discuss the implementation of the Programme of Multilateral Trade and Economic Cooperation and the work of the Business Council and the SCO Interbank Association. The heads of government will make a number of decisions on various aspects of the SCO, including the approval of its budget for 2019 and the adoption of a Joint Communique. This will be followed by an expanded meeting of SCO Council of Heads of Government, attended by delegations from observer states and SCO dialogue partners.

On the sidelines, Dmitry Medvedev will hold a series of bilateral meetings with foreign partners.

The Prime Minister’s message to the Premier of the State Council of China reads, in part:

“In the past decades, friendly China has achieved considerable success in various areas. It is important that the Russian-Chinese comprehensive trust-based partnership and strategic cooperation have reached an unprecedentedly high level. 

We are carrying out active coordinated work to implement large-scale joint projects in energy, industry, transport infrastructure, high technology, science, culture, and other areas. Our interregional and cross-border contacts are growing stronger as well. An eventful programme is underway as part of the 2018−2019 reciprocal Years of Russian-Chinese Interregional Cooperation. 

I am positive that through our joint efforts we will be able to give a new impetus to further boosting the entire scope of our comprehensive cooperation.”

The message reads, in part:

“On behalf of the Government of the Russian Federation and personally, I express heartfelt condolences over the numerous deaths and massive destruction caused by the quake and the tsunami on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi.

Mr President, I ask you to pass on the words of support to the families and friends of those who lost their lives and wishes of speedy recovery to those injured in this natural disaster.”

Russia-Finland talks.

Joint news conference by Dmitry Medvedev and Juha Sipilä following the talks 

Excerpts from the transcript:

Russia-Finland talks

26 September 2018

Dmitry Medvedev’s conversation with Prime Minister of Finland Juha Sipilä

26 September 2018

Joint press conference by Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister of Finland Juha Sipilä

26 September 2018

Joint press conference by Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister of Finland Juha Sipilä

26 September 2018

Предыдущая новость Следующая новость

Dmitry Medvedev: We have had productive, wide-ranging talks. It is our fourth meeting. We met twice in St Petersburg, once in the Prime Minister’s home town of Oulu. This is the best evidence that the most diverse issues can be resolved bilaterally even at a time when the Russian Federation and the European Union have fairly complicated relations.

Finland remains our reliable and constructive partner. By joint efforts, we have reversed the downturn in bilateral trade from two or three years ago. Trade is now growing. This is a direct result of more intensive efforts.

In this case, we compare our relations with Finland to 2013 because mutual trade peaked back then. And we still have to get back to those numbers. The task we set ourselves is to make Russia Finland’s top trading partner again, as it was some time ago. We are currently in third place trailing Germany and Switzerland. The key role here belongs to business – both fairly big businesses, as well as small and medium-sized businesses. Indeed, Finnish companies are quite active in the Russian market. They launch new projects, which we greatly appreciate. The Prime Minister said Finland’s investments amount to 12 billion, but according to our data, the number is 14 billion. I don’t know where the other two billion got lost but I hope the numbers properly reflect the situation with investments. 

We have major partners such as, for example, the Fortum concern which is operating in Russia, carrying out a number of very significant projects. The construction of the Hanhikivi 1 nuclear power plant, a large Russian project in Finland, was mentioned here. We discussed it today, including schedule issues. An important benchmark is issuing the construction licence for next year. The work should be accelerated, though it is a commercial project, of course. And we expect the shareholders will be actively involved in this work.

I would like to thank our partners and Finland in general for the proactive position on Nord Stream 2. Work has been underway on Finland’s part of the pipeline since 5 September.

More to be posted soon…

In 2018, the Russian Government certificates of merit for major contribution to the preservation of the Russian language and culture and consolidation of compatriots abroad were awarded to the internet TV channel ITON.TV (State of Israel), the Khabar Agency (Republic of Kazakhstan) and the weekly newspaper MK-Germany (Federal Republic of Germany).

Reference

The World Congress of Russian Press (hereinafter the Congress) is a global forum of Russian journalism held every year in different countries.

This year the Congress is taking place in New York.

 The Congress is organised by the World Association of Russian Press (WARP), the ITAR-TASS news agency and the World Russian Press Foundation (WARP Foundation). In the past few years a tradition has emerged to present the Russian Government certificates of merit to the Russian-language foreign media that enjoy the biggest prestige in their respective countries.

In 2017, the Russian Government’s certificates of merit were awarded to the Zvyazda publishing house (Republic of Belarus), the newspaper Russkoye Slovo (Republic of Moldova), the online newspaper Novosti Uzbekistana (Republic of Uzbekistan) and the Inforing Media publishing house (Republic of Estonia) (Government Directive 1457-r of July 10, 2017).

In 2018, according to the directive, the Russian Government certificates of merit for major contribution to the preservation of the Russian language and culture and consolidation of compatriots abroad were awarded to the internet TV channel ITON.TV (State of Israel), the Khabar Agency (Republic of Kazakhstan) and the weekly newspaper MK-Germany (Federal Republic of Germany).

The certificates were presented on September 24 in New York.