Putin discussed border issues in Karelia
Issues of perfection of customs registration in frontier areas was on the agenda when Russia’s Prime Minister Vladimir Putin had a meeting with the State Border Commission in Petrozavodsk on Thursday.
Karelia borders Finland in the west and many residents frequently travel to Finland for business, shopping or pleasure. Last year, Finland’s Consulate General in Petrozavodsk, the capital of the republic, handled 54 268 visa applications.
Implementation of coordinated boundary policy of the CIS was one of the issues considered at the meeting between Vladimir Putin and the State Border Commission, according to the official website of the Republic of Karelia.
Russian news-agency Itar-Tass quoted Putin saying; -As for border cooperation, economic cooperation, humanitarian and cultural ties, Russia is open for a close and interested partnership with the neighbours. The news agency writes Putin emphasized that work in that direction must proceed in close cooperation with regional authorities as they know better the situation in their regions.
Karelia is the southernmost member region of the Barents Cooperation.
Questions related to the suggested increase on customs duties were most likely another important issue discussed at the Petrozavodsk meeting. According to The Moscow Times, Russian customs in the first six months of 2009 contributed 1.3 trillion rubles to the federal budget, or a monthly average of 218 billion rubles (6.85 billion USD). In contrast, the customs service contributed an average of 391 billion rubles (12 billion USD) per month in 2008, and a record 4.7 trillion rubles (148 billion USD) for the whole year.
The government has reacted to this drop with a range of measures mostly focused on raising tariffs and increasing controls, The Moscow Times writes on Friday.
Before the meeting with the Border Commission on Thursday, Putin visited the famous island of Valaam. Here Putin meet with Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and attended a prayer in one of the monastery’s churches.
Patriarch Kirill told the Prime Minister how, during the Soviet-Finnish war, the monks tried to save the monastery’s treasures by transporting them across the ice from Valaam, reports the website of the Russian Government.
