Burundi, Russia Want Economic Contacts To Live Up To Level Of Political Ties - Ambassador

Fakhir Rizvi Published February 13, 2019 | 08:15 PM

Burundi and Russia have already developed close political cooperation in the international arena, and are now putting their focus on economic cooperation and contacts between national businesses, the African country's ambassador in Moscow, Edouard Bizimana, told Sputnik

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 13th February, 2019) Burundi and Russia have already developed close political cooperation in the international arena, and are now putting their focus on economic cooperation and contacts between national businesses, the African country's ambassador in Moscow, Edouard Bizimana, told Sputnik.

"Russia and Burundi support each other in different spheres of cooperation, be it in the UN or in other international organizations ... I think now we are focusing on economic aspects because they have been neglected, I would say. But, we see that there are a lot of things to be done in this sector," Bizimana said.

As an example, he mentioned his country's regular participation in the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF), other economic and investment forums, as well as plans to attend the Russian Investment Forum in Sochi later in the week.

"From this participation we've been able to meet many investors from Russia and on the part from Burundi people came and made contacts so we now have coffee or tea from Burundi, which is already available in Russia and I think, you know, there are some Russian companies which are already active in Burundi. So it's really interesting to see how this aspect of economic cooperation is really becoming very, very dynamic," he explained.

Bizimana also mentioned education and student exchanges as a priority area, where active cooperation was being maintained.

One of the examples of Russian-Burundian economic cooperation is joint venture Tanganyika Gold, which started work at the Chimba open cast mine in the Cibitoke province in late 2017. The company then planned to produce 50 tonnes of gold ore per hour.