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President Vladimir Putin: Your Majesty, I am very glad to have the opportunity to welcome you to Moscow. I am very pleased that you were able to come to Russia with such a large delegation — with members of the business community and academia.

King Carl Xvi Gustaf of Sweden: This time we are travelling together with a royal technical delegation composed of members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences and representatives from industry, business and education — members of universities, rectors — as well as other people involved in Swedish economic spheres. We are in Moscow for a little less than a day and before that we were in Samara. It is a very interesting trip.

Vladimir Putin: In connection with this I would like to point out that we attach great importance to developing cooperation between regions. I hope that during your visit new direct contacts between our countries’ business communities will be established.

King Carl Xvi Gustaf: Indeed, in Samara we were interested to see that the city has strong ties with Linkoping, a Swedish city with a very important university.

Vladimir Putin: This promotes further cooperation. Russians have always been very interested in Sweden, in its history and culture. We publish books by Swedish writers and perform works by Swedish authors in our theatres. We know that the Queen of Sweden pays a lot of attention to children’s problems.

King Carl Xvi Gustaf: Indeed, she made a private visit to Russia a year ago and has visited St Petersburg several times on this account. And of course we warmly remember our state visit that we made in 2001.

Vladimir Putin: I would like to ask you to convey my best wishes and gratitude for the attention that Queen Sylvia has shown not just to children with problems but also to the Russian organisations concerned.

I know that you love sports and pay a great deal of attention to developing sports. You may have heard that Sochi would like to host the 2014 Olympic Winter Games and if our bid is successful, I would like to invite you and your family in advance to Sochi for the opening of the games. I would like to have you there as guests of honour. Of course, provided that Sochi does host the games.

King Carl Xvi Gustaf: This is quite a long road: it is difficult to get the Olympics. Sweden has long tried to host the Olympics but never has.

Vladimir Putin: Perhaps the first step would be hosting the Olympics in Russia, one of Sweden’s neighbours?

King Carl Xvi Gustaf: So the Olympics are approaching.

Vladimir Putin: Quite right.

King Carl Xvi Gustaf: But first, China.