Putin urges investors to invest in Russia’s Far East

As Russia’s economy stutters, buffeted by cheap oil and Western sanctions imposed over the Ukraine crisis, Putin is turning his attention to the country’s Far East region where he hopes Asian money can generate some much-needed prosperity.

“(We) will provide to investors the best conditions to do business so the Far East of Russian Federation can successfully compete in terms of efficiency and return on capital with leading business centres”, Putin told participants at the inaugural forum. At an East Asia financial summit in Vladivostok on Friday, the top of Russia’s largest oil firm, Rosneft Chief Government Igor Sechin, informed Russian Federation At this time tv that the power industries anticipated commerce with Beijing to quantity to $500 billion over the subsequent 20 years.

He confirmed a 500 billion rouble – $7.4 billion – upgrade to key rail arteries in Siberia, Trans-Siberian and Baikal-Amur Mainline (BAM).

“We need to work out what to do”, he said. But there was no breakthrough on major infrastructure projects, underscoring the limits to a relationship Moscow has cast as a counterweight to the West.

The Russian president believes that another avenue for developing the Far East is the creation of a network of scientific centers in the Asia-Pacific region.

There was no breakthrough either for energy behemoth Gazprom, which has been reported to be seeking Chinese funding for a gas pipeline to China via Russia’s Altai region.

Referencing the Lisbon Treaty, he said: “The inward-looking peace project has acquired a new somewhat messianic dimension – the European Union now “seeks to advance in the wider world… principles which have inspired its own creation”. ‘This is nearly a done deal.

South Korean company Joeun Mulsan Co. Putin also suggested extending the preferences of the free port to other Far Eastern harbors. Ltd. ‘Of course, definitely, I would recommend [Singapore firms] investing [in the Russian Far East],’ he said.

In Moscow, similarly, optimism about China substantially helping Russian Federation out of its economic problems has faded.

After the meeting, the two heads of state witnessed the signing of a number of agreements for cooperation in various fields. “But we’d like to diversify and widen with Japan, Korea … and other countries“.