BEIJING, October 24 (RIA Novosti) - Russia's prime minister will visit China November 9-10, the Chinese Foreign Ministry's spokesman said Tuesday.
Liu Jianchao said Mikhail Fradkov will be visiting by invitation from Wen Jiabao, the premier of the country's State Council.
"The head of Russia's government, together with the State Council's premier, will hold an 11th regular meeting of the Russian and Chinese governments, and will take part in the closing ceremony of the Year of Russia in China," Jianchao said.
Last year, Russia was China's eighth largest trading partner after the United States, Japan, South Korea, Germany, Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia. Trade turnover between the two countries exceeded $29 billion in 2005.
Russia and China are planning to more than double the current annual turnover in the near future.
Meeting with the parliamentary speakers of the Group of Eight industrialized nations, President Vladimir Putin said in September that Russian oil supplies to the Asia-Pacific region would account for at least 30% of overall exports in 10 years' time.
And one important project to increase supplies to the region is the construction of the East Siberia-Pacific Ocean (ESPO) oil pipeline.
Construction on the ESPO, preliminarily estimated at $11.5 billion, began in April 2006. Since then, more than 100 kilometers (62 miles) have been laid and 330 kilometers (205 miles) have been prepared for pipe installation.
The pipeline is expected to pump 80 million metric tons of oil per year, including 30 million tons to energy-hungry China via an offshoot, whose construction is about to start.
This year, Russia wants to increase oil supplies to China from the earlier planned 10 to 15 million metric tons. China's crude demand is expected to rise by 5%-7% a year.
Putin said in March during his visit to China that gas to China will come from two projects and will require the construction of a new pipeline, which he said had been given the working name Altai.
"We also know the delivery volumes - 30-40 billion cubic meters of gas a year on each project," he said, adding that both East and West Siberia have enough resources to cope.
In fact, Russia has proven natural gas reserves of 47 trillion cubic meters, the world's largest, dwarfing China's 1.5 trillion, which means it is poised to play a key role in the People's Republic's bid to diversify its energy supply away from its copious supplies of coal in the next few decades.
China and Russia are also linked by military and nuclear cooperation agreements.
Rosoboronexport, Russia's state arms export monopoly, is completing talks on the sale to China of about 50 Sukhoi Su-33 Naval Flanker fighters, worth $2.5 billion.
If successful, this will be the second most expensive national arms sale contract after a $3 billion agreement for the assembly of 140 Su-30MKI fighters in India under a Russian license.
According to the Pentagon, China buys about 95% of its new weapons from Russia. Its 2006 Annual Report on the military power of the People's Republic of China said Russia remains the leading supplier of weapons to China and continues to cooperate with the country on a variety of technical and logistics issues, which allows China to maintain and modernize its large military potential.
According to Pentagon analysts, China has bought Su-27 Flanker fighters and Su-30 Flanker interceptors, AA-12 Adder medium-range air-to-air missiles, SA-10 Grumble, SA-15 Gauntlet and SA-20 Triumf surface-to-air missiles, 3M-54E (SS-N-27B) anti-ship cruise missiles, Kilo-class diesel submarines, Sovremennyi-class destroyers, Il-76 Candid transport planes and Il-78 Midas in-flight refueling tankers.
The Pentagon said in 2000-2005 that China has concluded a series of contracts on military hardware deliveries with Russia worth $13 billion, and has already received $11 billion worth of weaponry under the deals.
Russia's nuclear power equipment and service export monopoly, Atomstroiexport, has been building the Tianwan NPP, which uses improved VVER-1000 reactors and K-100-6/3000 turbo-generators, under the terms of a Russian-Chinese agreement signed in 1992.
