Cooperation proposal
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin met with the International Business Council at the Davos forum yesterday. The 115-member council includes six Russian businessmen, among them German Gref, President of Sberbank, Ruben Vardanyan, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Troika Dialog, Oleg Deripaska, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of Basic Element, Alexander Izosimov, Director General of VimpelCom, Andrei Kostin, President of VTB, and Alexei Mordashov, Director General of Severstal.
The meeting was mostly held behind closed doors. Mr Putin spoke about Russia's bright future and proposed exchanging assets, but only on equal terms, a source on the Russian delegation said. It was decided not to disclose the details of the meeting, said one of the businessmen who attended the meeting. Mr Putin's press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, also refused to disclose details.
The Prime Minister first proposed exchanging energy assets on Wednesday. But yesterday he cited a suitable example, the construction of the Nord Stream gas pipeline along the Baltic Sea bed jointly with Germany (see the transcript of the meeting on the Government's website).
"We need cooperation not only in the energy sector, but also in high technologies, space exploration and aircraft manufacturing," Mr Putin said. He said he liked the signals coming from the United States, such as the intention to pull out of Iraq.
Presidential Aide Arkady Dvorkovich said it could be considered "the beginning of a broad discussion". In his words, forum participants are divided over Mr Putin's speech.
"Many of them possibly expected to see a more aggressive Russian stance," said Stanislav Voskresensky, Deputy Minister of Economic Development.
First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov said at the forum that the Russian Government was completing work on a new anti-crisis package and would make it public within the next few weeks, Interfax reports.
An official of the ministry who attended discussions of the package said the new measures would cost the budget 1.5 trillion roubles.
Nadezhda Ivanitskaya