MOSCOW, May 25 (RIA Novosti) - The new Russia-EU Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA) will be discussed at a round table in the city of Perm by representatives of the Russian and European parliaments, according to Konstantin Kosachev, head of the Russian parliament's committee on international affairs.
He said the participants in the Perm meeting plan to define the general guidelines for a strategic partnership between Russia and the European Union. Most of them chair profile committees in their national parliaments, Kosachev added.
Andrei Klimov, a member of the pro-Kremlin United Russia party who heads the lower house of the Russian parliament's subcommittee on European cooperation, said the Russian and European MPs may also discuss measures to accelerate high-level negotiations on a new Russia-EU PCA.
Klimov emphasized that the roundtable participants will directly focus on issues related to reaching a new basic agreement.
"It is important to save Russia from all sorts of ‘surprise issues' which can emerge later just because we have overlooked them during the initial discussion," he told reporters.
Klimov dubbed the Perm meeting the "zero reading" of the draft agreement reached by members of parliament, which will be held at the same time as negotiations between heads of state and foreign ministers on Russia-EU relations.
