Official website of the President of Russia

Transcripts   /

President Vladimir Putin:

Ladies and Gentlemen,

It gives me genuine pleasure to welcome to Moscow our distinguished guest, the Sultan of Brunei.

I have very warm recollections of our meeting at the APEC summit that took place in Brunei in 2000. We had an exceptionally useful discussion of fundamental cooperation issues in the Asia-Pacific region.

This visit is the first visit by His Majesty to Russia and we see it as the beginning of a promising new stage in the relations between our countries.

The agenda for the talks we held was substantial and covered a variety of areas.

We focused above all on bilateral cooperation issues and exchanged views on how to give our bilateral cooperation more substance.

Over the not quite 15 years since diplomatic relations were established between our countries we have built up friendly ties and have established a fruitful political dialogue.

Today, it is important to give our regular political contacts a solid economic and legal foundation. In this context, we are ready to propose a number of promising investment projects in regions such as Siberia and the Far East. Russian companies could take part in the construction of facilities for the metallurgical industry in Brunei, as well as electricity production facilities, including facilities using renewable and non-traditional energy sources.

We also see good prospects for military-technical cooperation and investment opportunities, including investment in third countries.

We will make concrete proposals for expanding our contacts in science, education, medicine and the active development of tourism.

We have agreed to speed up the preparation of a number of bilateral agreements, in particular, agreements on simplifying visa procedures for holders of diplomatic and service passports and on protection and incentives for investment.

We also discussed a wide range of international issues during our talks. Russia sees Brunei as one of our promising partners in the Asia-Pacific region. We place great importance on our cooperation with Brunei in organisations such as APEC, ASEAN and the Organisation of the Islamic Conference.

I would like to thank the Sultan of Brunei for his support for a rapprochement between our country and ASEAN. We think that the first Russian-ASEAN summit, set to take place in Kuala Lumpur in December 2005, will help to enrich our dialogue with this forum, whose work has a positive impact on developing cooperation with the integration organisations in the Asia-Pacific region.

In conclusion, I would like to thank His Majesty for his constructive approach to all the issues discussed during our talks. I am sure that relations between Russia and Brunei will continue to work effectively for the benefit of our peoples, and that we will enrich our bilateral cooperation with successful joint projects in many different areas.

Thank you.

Sultan of Brunei Hassanal Bolkiah:

Mr President,

Distinguished representatives of the press,

I would like to thank the President of the Russian Federation for his warm words in my address.

It is a great honour and pleasure for me to be here. I would like to thank you personally and your country’s government for the excellent organisation of my visit.

I would also like to express my deep gratitude to the people of Russia for this warm reception. This is a great honour for me and I am very grateful to you. I also wish to thank the journalists for being present here today. I know that you have much work to do and have to cover the events taking place in your country’s capital city. I thank you for the attention you have given my visit. I know that this is also very important for the people of Brunei, for whom it is a clear sign of the friendship that has developed between our small country and your huge nation.

I have had deep respect for President Putin ever since we met in Brunei when the APEC summit was taking place. This has helped considerably to strengthen the relations between our countries that developed over the 1990s, both at bilateral level and with our partners in Southeast Asia and ASEAN.

I have already thanked the President of the Russian Federation for the contribution that he personally and the Russian government make to developing our region and to strengthening peace and security in Asia in general.

One of the aims of my visit is to affirm that Russia really does play a very important part in Asian regional issues. This concerns the whole spectrum of modern international cooperation. It is a great honour for Brunei to share its views on security both in our region and in the world in general with a permanent member of the United Nations Security Council. We try to settle these issues on a multilateral basis because we believe that security should be examined in the full sense of the word. We think this is something positive that concerns the everyday lives of our citizens. This is why we place such great value on the stability that enables our families, our countries, to feel confident about the future. We do not want our future to be jeopardised by threats of any sort, neither external nor internal. We think that people can build up this kind of confidence only by developing mutual understanding, increasing contacts with each other and developing respect for each other.

We need to respect the diversity that reigns among us and share the experience we have all accumulated. This was precisely the spirit in which President Putin and I discussed such issues as defence and security at our talks this morning. I think these discussions have enabled us to take a step forward in developing interaction and cooperation between our countries in this very important area for our work together.

Of course, our discussions were not limited to these questions. We examined not only regional and international issues but also looked at specific bilateral cooperation development issues. In particular, we looked at the possibility of the Russian government, the Russian people, taking part in helping us to reach priority objectives in our country.

Above all, this concerns diversifying our economy and moving away from excessive reliance on the oil and gas industry. We discussed, in particular, possibilities for developing trade, investment and tourism.

These issues are of particular importance for us at this stage of our development and we would welcome the development of closer cooperation with Russia.

Overall, I am happy with the discussions we had during our meeting this morning.

It is a great honour and pleasure for me to be here in Moscow. I am looking forward to further work together with President Putin and with the government and people of your country.

Let me assure you that you will receive a warm welcome if you visit our country. This warm welcome goes equally for the journalists. Once again, I thank you for coming here today. We would be very happy to see you in our country should you decide to come.

Mr President, let me thank you for the friendship and the hospitality you have shown me.

We are also grateful for the warm reception we have received from the people of your vast country.

Thank you.