Algeria, Russia have “good prospects” for economic and commercial cooperation

APS: Monday, 29 February 2016 17:06
ALGIERS- Algeria and Russia have “good prospects” for the economic and commercial cooperation, said Monday in Algiers, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov.

“We have already noticed that we have good prospects for our economic and commercial cooperation, and we have to intensify the works of the inter-governmental committee on the economic and commercial cooperation,” Lavrov said at the end of his meeting with Minister of State, Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, Ramtane Lamamra.

Recalling that the two countries already have a bilateral committee on military and technical cooperation, Lavrov indicated that recently, Algerian operators explored in Moscow the possibilities of cooperation between the Russian and Algerian companies.

For the Russian Foreign Minister, his visit chiefly aimed at “coming to an agreement on all the concrete measures allowing the implementation of the Declaration of Strategic Partnership, signed in 2001 between Russia and Algeria, on the occasion of the visit of President Abdelaziz Bouteflika”.

“Today, we give particular attention to the implementation of our strategic partnership, notably the creation of favorable conditions for our strategic partnership, given the problems which exist in the Middle East regions,” he underlined.

Lavrov said he “very much appreciates” the efforts spent by Algeria to for the settlement of the crises in Libya and Mali and generally in the region of Sahel, affirming that “our analyses and our approaches in the settlement of those crises are close and similar.”

In this regard, Lavrov said the two countries agree so that the resolution of any crisis relies on “the international law and the UN Charter,” but also “the respect of the sovereignty and the territorial integrity of States and avoid any influence on their internal policy.”

He declared that his country is grateful to “our Algerian friends” for the support “they provided” to the International Support Group for Syria, co-chaired by Russia and the US.”

The arrangement within this group, approved by the UN Security Council tends to “lighten and improve the humanitarian situation in Syria, to stop violence with the approval of all the parties, through an inclusive process aiming at applying the Resolutions 22 and 54 of the UN Security Council,” he added.

Moreover, Lavrov said that a “unanimous vision” resulted from this meeting, stressing the need for “speeding up the work” to settle the “Palestinian question,” by implementing “all the resolutions of the UN Security Council and all the international commitments, made by all the parties to this issue.”

“I am confident that after these talks in Algiers, we can coordinate more closely our actions in the international arena,” he argued.

Questioned on the oil and gas market, Lavrov underlined that there are “too many factors that impact the energy market and that all the officials of this sectors in their respective countries must take into account, whether members of OPEC or not.”

“Our Energy Ministry has already initiated a dialogue among OPEC member countries and the non-member countries,” he recalled, adding that this dialogue “will continue in the quest for a balance of interests between exporting and importing countries.”

As for gas, Lavrov said that Algeria and Russia “cooperate” in this area, as well as other countries that are part of the forum of gas exporting countries, which is “extremely useful.”