Talks with President of Equatorial Guinea Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo

The discussion
focused on the further development of bilateral ties in various spheres, as well as current international and regional issues.
Before the meeting, Vladimir Putin and Teodoro Obiang Nguema Mbasogo Nguema Mbasogo Teodoro ObiangPresident of the Republic of Equatorial Guinea addressed the plenary
session of the Russian Energy Week International Forum.
* * *
President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Mr President, friends,
I am delighted
to welcome you all to Moscow once again. We are very happy to see you.
We have just taken
part in the Russian Energy Week, which is held regularly and, as I mentioned in my address, has long become a salient part of the global energy agenda. This
forum brings together many colleagues from all over the world who work in the energy sector and are our partners or may become our partners soon.
Your country
is our partner in the OPEC, and we have been successfully cooperating with Equatorial
Guinea in the OPEC Plus format for a long time. Our common goal is to stabilise
global energy markets. Overall, we have been addressing this task rather
effectively, jointly with our partners in these organisations.
As concerns
our bilateral relations, the re-establishment of our respective diplomatic
missions will certainly be instrumental in their development. I hope that the missions will operate in full force. We established diplomatic relations a long
time ago, and they have a good, long history.
We certainly
have very good potential for developing our bilateral economic ties. We are
collaborating in the humanitarian sphere, including in the training of national
professionals for your country. We are ready to continue this effort. There are
also good prospects in the field of military-technical cooperation.
Mr President,
I am happy to see you. At the beginning of our conversation, I would like to thank you for dedicating so much personal time over many years to the development of our interstate relations.
Mr President,
welcome to Russia.
President of Equatorial Guinea Teodoro Obiang
Nguema Mbasogo (retranslated):
First of all, I would like to extend our people’s fraternal greetings to President
of Russia Vladimir Putin and thank him for the warm and hospitable welcome.
I would also like to express my gratitude for inviting us to attend this forum, which is a highly respected event. This
morning, we attended a plenary session of the State Duma, which was another
instructive event for Equatorial Guinea. I would like to convey best regards
from our Government and people to the Government and people of the Russian
Federation. At the same time, I would like to thank you for the wonderful
organisation of this forum. It is a very important event for the development of the energy sector.
It is an extremely important sector for Africa,
but there is much to strive for, and there is a great deal we can do to develop
this sector. We have no mobile coverage to speak of, and our energy network is
insufficient for our people.
Friendly countries should maintain and expand
energy cooperation. We hope that Russian businesses will come to Equatorial
Guinea and contribute to the development of the economic sectors in which they
would like to work. We invite them and look forward to more active cooperation.
I would like to express my gratitude to my friend, Vladimir Putin, for sending instructors to help strengthen our national
security and defence capability, which is vital for our country, considering
the challenges we are facing. However, we have survived and are living thanks
to support from our society. Our society has welcomed the arrival of Russian
experts. The training our citizens will receive from them will help us
strengthen our national defences.
Equatorial Guinea is virtually the only country
in the region that does not have such problems as armed groups, but we are
suffering from the consequences of piracy. Russia’s presence is of great
importance to us in this regard.
I also see that our economic ties and trade relations
are good and that they are growing stronger. We hope that Russia will be able
to open a bank in Equatorial Guinea, which would simplify commercial
transactions.
We would also like Russia to support Equatorial
Guinea’s bid to join BRICS, and we hope it will do so.
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