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A number of agreements on cooperation were signed following the talks.

Mr Putin and Mr Gentiloni witnessed the signing of:

An agreement between Rosneft and ENI on expanding cooperation in production, processing, marketing and trading;

An agreement between Rosneft and Tecnoclima on cooperation in supplies, modernisation, and servicing heating and ventilation systems for drilling installations;

A production cooperation agreement between Rosneft and Pietro Fiorentini;

An agreement between the Russian Direct Investment Fund, State Company Russian Highways, Italian state company ANAS S.p.A and ANAS International Enterprise S.p.A on investment and technology cooperation on public-private partnership projects in the road sector in Russia.

Other agreements signed following the talks include a cooperation agreement between Rosneft, Moscow State Institute of International Relations (MGIMO), and the Polytechnic University of Turin, and an agreement between Rosneft, Gubkin Russian State University of Oil and Gas, and the Polytechnic University of Turin.

Mr Putin and Mr Gentiloni made press statements and answered journalists’ questions.

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Beginning of meeting with Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni

President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Mr Prime Minister, friends,

Let me greet you again and welcome you to Russia this time. We met just recently in China. It is a great pleasure to see you again.

During your time as foreign minister, you visited Russia often as head of the intergovernmental commission. Regrettably, we have seen a drop in our trade, but the moment you became prime minister, our bilateral trade began to grow again and was up 28 percent over the first two months of this year.

We have very intensive contacts at the political level. Italy holds a non-permanent seat on the UN Security Council. We are very pleased to have this chance to have a calm exchange of views on everything I mentioned during your working visit.

Prime Minister of Italy Paolo Gentiloni (retranslated): Thank you, Mr President,

I am very pleased to have this chance to meet with you and discuss matters concerning Russian-Italian relations, which I personally consider very successful, even excellent relations, and to discuss very sensitive matters pertaining to the international situation.

I am not sure that the achievement you spoke of can be credited to our council on bilateral economic and financial cooperation, but I do agree with you that we are seeing substantial growth in our economic relations.

Given that Italy currently holds the G7 presidency, this is also an opportunity for me to meet with Mr Putin to discuss current matters on the eve of the summit in Taormina, which will take place in 10 days’ time.

In short, we have plenty to discuss, whether bilateral cooperation or the international situation. Mr President, I thank you once again for this opportunity to meet.

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