Rustam Minnikhanov meets President of the Republic of Abkhazia Aslan Bzhania

On 11 July in the Kazan Kremlin Tatarstan President Rustam Minnikhanov had a meeting with President of the Republic of Abkhazia Aslan Bzhania. 

In his opening speech, Rustam Minnikhanov expressed his gratitude to Alsan Bzhania for his visit and interest to cooperation with Tatarstan in the framework of Russia-Abkhazia relations. “We are happy to see how economy is developing in Abkhazia, including food and wine production, agriculture, manufacture of construction materials, mining and hydro power industry. Tourism and health resort services are also very promising”, Minnikhanov said. 

He underlined that Tatarstan and Abkhazia have had long and good history since 1994 when they signed an Agreement on Friendship and cooperation. 

He remarked that the current trade turnover between the republics is rather small but there are all possibilities for increasing its volume as Tatarstan is interested in supplying Kamaz trucks, tyres, machine-building and petrochemical products as well as pharmaceutical and medical goods. Minnikhanov added that Tatarstan is also ready to share its experience in development of the territory and establishment of modern urban infrastructure. 

He said that agribusiness, IT and healthcare spheres are also promising and concluded: ”We should look for new cooperation possibilities and I hope that today’s meeting will give a nice impetus to our relations”.  

In his turn Aslan Bzhania thanked for a high level organization of the visit of Abkhaz delegation. “I am very pleased to be here. In the context of our relationship with Russia we are ready to develop ties with its entities. I was pleasantly surprised by and our delegation is admiring the way your republic is developing. I would like to pay attention to the fact that Tatarstan administration managed to preserve industrial enterprises and what is more – to renovate them”, he said. 

Aslan Bzhania expressed his interest in further development of cooperation with Tatarstan “We have two sea ports and there are possibilities for transit. We are ready to work in this direction”, he added.