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President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Mr Atambayev, friends, allow me to welcome you sincerely to Moscow.

There is no need to talk about the nature of our relations – Kyrgyzstan is our reliable partner, with whom we have developed truly strategic relations. Its accession to the Eurasian Economic Union only expands the opportunities for our cooperation. I hope that this will improve not just our indicators, but also the real life in our nations and contribute to the development of our economies and social sectors.

I would like to note that in this regard, I feel our contacts are developing favourably: I am referring to the number of Kyrgyzstani citizens working on a practically permanent basis in the Russian Federation. Russia remains Kyrgyzstan’s main trade and economic partner.

True, we see a slight decrease in turnover due to the events we all know about – first and foremost, due to fluctuations in exchange rates, but we are nevertheless confidently in the first place, accounting for over 27% of turnover; I believe that China is behind us at just over 12%.

As agreed, we will strive to diversify our relations, and I feel we have all the foundations to do this. We have all the foundations to think exactly that. We have an interstate commission headed by Director of the Russian Customs Service Andrei Belyaninov: it has drafted and adopted a plan of action covering all the measures we have planned for the near future.

We are very happy to see you here and to have this opportunity to discuss all aspects of our cooperation.

Welcome.

President of Kyrgyzstan Almazbek Atambayev: Thank you, Mr Putin. I am also happy to see you and other members of the Russian delegation.

And, of course, I am happy for the opportunity to once again discuss all the current issues between our nations, because we have more than just large turnovers. First and foremost, we are strategic partners, and I hope that this will be the case in the future as well. This is what’s most important for us: that Russia is our main strategic partner.

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