As part of the activities belonging to the XXVII edition of the Saint Petersburg International Economic Forumwhich takes place from June 5 to 8, the President of Bolivia Luis Arce met with Vladimir Putin, president of Russia. Representatives from 136 countries participate in the meeting.
The dialogue took place at the Constantine Palace, Putin’s residence, and the work agenda included industrial technological investment, development of railway tracksinvestment in gas exploitation by the Russian company Gazpromdevelopment of lithium deposits in Bolivia and the construction of a plant for the processing of lithium carbonate in Potosi.
“The Bilateral relations between Russia and Bolivia are developing on solid foundations and taking into account the interests of each one. The total volume of trade in monetary terms is still small, but it has good growth trends“Putin remarked. According to Russian sources, trade between both countries reached 100 million dollars in 2023, which means 2.3 times more than in 2022.
Arce’s testimony was added to his testimony: “We are advancing an important work agenda to strengthen our bilateral relations in the commercial, nuclear energy and the industrialization of our lithium“.
In addition to the energy agenda, Bolivia aims to get closer to the member countries of the BRICS (originally composed of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa), which in August 2023 announced that they were expanding the number of members: Egypt, Iran, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia, Ethiopia and Argentina joined. However, on December 29 of last year, the president Javier Milei announced in a letter his resignation from belonging to the international association.
Arce received an Honoris Causa, Putin met with Dilma Rousseff
Within the framework of the parallel agendas of both officials on Thursday, The president of Bolivia received an Honoris Causa doctorate from the Saint Petersburg State Universityan institution that turned 300 years old and where President Vladimir Putin was trained.
The distinction to Luis Arce was from his “outstanding contribution to the development of economic science and education”, in addition to the recognition of his “active role” in strengthening ties between his country and Russia. Likewise, they sealed agreements to finance exchange programs for Bolivian students to Russian universities.
This same Thursday, Putin held a meeting with the president of the New BRICS Development Bank, Dilma Rousseff, in which they highlighted that the financial organization will be able to “make up for the absence of necessary investments for the countries of the global south and we do not impose conditionality on our members,” according to the Brazilian. “The countries of the so-called global north have been incapable of providing solutions to the serious problems facing humanity,” added the former South American president.
In addition to the work meeting, the invitation to Lula da SilvaPresident of Brazilto the next summit of the BRICS in the Russian city of Kazanwhich will take place between October 22 and 24.
Source: Ambito
