Russia, China to raise goods turnover to $15 bln?

Wen Jiabao, Premier of the Chinese State Council, thinks it possible to raise the size of Russian-Chinese goods turnover to $15 billion, Sergei Mironov, speaker of the Russian Federation Council, told a press conference in Beijing after a Tuesday meeting with Wen Jiabao.

As of today, the size of commercial operations between the two countries totals $12 billion.

The premier and the speaker of the upper house of the Russian parliament had been discussing the prospects of developing bilateral cooperation. According to Mironov, Moscow and Beijing think the most promising spheres are nuclear power engineering, civil aircraft construction, and mechanical engineering.

The sides had also focused their attention on construction of an oil pipeline connecting the Siberian city of Angarsk and the Russian Far Eastern port of Nakhodka, with a branch leading to Datsin, China. According to Mironov's account, Moscow is busy drawing up a feasibility study of the pipeline in order to come up with a mutually acceptable solution.

The Russian speaker said the future of Russian-Chinese energy cooperation looked extremely promising.