Russian-American Energy Summit to be held in St Petersburg in September 2003

The summit will feature leading Russian and American businessmen, bankers, scientists and academicians as well representatives of the Russian Federal Assembly and the Russian president. Russian Minister for Economic Development German Gref, US Secretary of Commerce Donald Evans, Russian Minister for Energy Igor Yusufov and US Secretary for Energy Spencer Abraham are also expected to attend the summit.

The first energy summit took place in October 2002 in Houston and was attended by such people as Mikhail Hodorkovsky (YUKOS), Vagit Alekperov (LUKOIL) and Igor Makarov (Itera). The summit led to the creation of a permanent organisation called the Russian-American Commercial Energy Dialogue. Cochairmen of the organising committee became President of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs Arkady Volsky and President of the American Chamber of Commerce in Moscow Andrew Somers. The organisation is designed to make recommendations to the US and Russian governments on how to develop bilateral trading relations in the energy sphere.

News source: www.rosbaltnews.com