Photo credit: twitter.com/ru_forumafrica
The Russia-Africa Economic Forum kicks off on Wednesday, October 23, ahead of the summit scheduled for Thursday, TASS reports. Representatives of fifty-four countries from the African continent are invited to Sochi.
About ten thousand people will join the forum. Its program will include about three dozen business sessions, which will discuss prospects for the development of Africa in the field of economy, strengthening trade relations between Russia and African countries. An important topic will be joint investment projects.
It is planned to discuss cooperation in the field of nuclear technologies, joint projects in the oil and gas industry and the transport sector and cooperation between Russian and African banks.
A separate session will be devoted to deepening military and technical cooperation which is needed due to the problem of the fight against terrorism. Biosafety issues will be discussed during the meeting. Another round table will be a place for discussion of dialogue in the diamond mining industry.
Russkiy Mir
reported that the Russian President Vladimir Putin called the Russia-Africa Summit an unprecedented event. The forum to be first high-level meeting bringing together leaders from different countries of the African continent and heads of major associations of the region.
Putin expressed hope that guests from Africa would present proposals at the summit that would help promote cooperation. He assured that Moscow also had plans aimed at strengthening ties in all areas with African states.
The Russian leader is convinced that the forum will be successful because there are all the necessary conditions for this. In his opinion, at the present stage, Russian-African relations are on the rise.
Vladimir Putin is scheduled to meet with his colleague from Egypt, Abdel Fattah al-Sisi. In total, the Russian leader will hold eight separate meetings with leaders of African countries.
Russkiy Mir
