Russia, Libya said determined to revive cooperation
Text of report in English by Russian news agency Interfax
Moscow, 15th November: Russia and Libya are determined to energetically revive cooperation virtually frozen after the imposition of international sanctions against Libya in 1992.
Contracts were signed or prepared for signing worth 1bn dollars during the recent fourth session of an intergovernmental commission for trade, economic and scientific cooperation in Tripoli, a participant in the session, Russian Deputy Minister for Emergency Situations Yuriy Brazhnikov, has told Interfax.
Emergency Situations' Minister Sergey Shoygu is the Russian co-chairman of the commission. Brazhnikov said that the contract for the reconstruction of a thermal power plant in Tripoli alone amounts to 650m dollars.
"It is an open secret that cooperation between Libya and the Soviet Union was dominated by arms sales and related services. Now, both sides have declared that trade and economic ties have prospects of coming to the fore," he said.
Asked about the spheres in which Russia would be interested in cooperating with Libya, Brazhnikov named the oil and gas sector, in particular, oil and gas prospecting and extraction and the construction of oil and gas pipelines. "This is the subject of the first contract and first operations that are already under way," he said.
The energy sector, including nuclear power engineering, is another priority, Brazhnikov said, adding that Russia will modernize the Sultan nuclear power plant and a nuclear research centre, the construction of which began back in the Soviet times. |
