Turkmenistan's President highly appreciates meeting with Russia's President

Turkmenistan's President Saparmurat Niyazov has appreciated the results of his bilateral talks with Russia's President Vladimir Putin and the Agreement on Friendship and Cooperation signed afterwards. When speaking on the national television, Niyazov said that this 10-year agreement strengthens economic and cultural cooperation between Russia and Turkmenistan and will let the two countries expand their bilateral relations. He pointed out that even Turkmens' ancestors had close cooperation with this "huge state with great people and history" and said that "Russia supports the idea of bilateral economic relations". Despite the earlier misunderstanding of activities of the state authorities and companies in the two countries, the negotiations with Putin, that lasted for several hours, "were effective", "different reservations and misunderstanding" disappeared, said the Turkmen president, adding that in future the Russian-Turkmen relations will be strengthening.