BARI, Italy (AP) – Russian and Italian political and business leaders signed accords strengthening their economic ties Wednesday, including deals for building an airliner and for developing nuclear power projects and a railway system.
The talks, including visiting Russian President Vladimir Putin and Italian Premier Romano Prodi, were held in the Adriatic port city of Bari.
“This is the best proof of the strategic partnership between Italy and Russia,” Prodi said during a joint news conference with Putin.
Prodi said the two discussed international affairs as well as Russia’s human rights record, amid allegations of human rights violations in Russia under Putin’s tenure.
Italian power supplier Enel said it signed a memorandum of understanding with Russia’s nuclear energy agency, Rosatom, on developing electricity and nuclear power projects in Russia and Central and Eastern Europe.
Other agreements included one between Italy’s defense company, Finmeccanica SpA, and Russian railways to develop a regional train along the Black Sea coast joining the cities of Tuapse and Adler; and one for the joint construction and marketing of a medium-range civilian plane known as the “Superjet100.”
Italy is Russia’s third-largest commercial trading partner, after Germany and China, with Russian-Italian trade in 2006 totaling more than $27.68 billion.
Officials from the two countries also agreed to open a northern Italian branch, in Ferrara, of Russia’s State Hermitage museum, which is located in St. Petersburg.
Putin, who met Tuesday with Pope Benedict XVI at the Vatican, was received with military honors in Bari, where about 1,500 residents also lined the streets around the central Piazza della Liberta to greet the Russian leader.
“Let’s hope this visit results in something good, like jobs for young people,” said student Antonio Buttiglione, 20, who had waited for three hours in hopes of getting a glimpse of Putin – without luck.
Tight security included snipers on rooftops along the half-hour ride from the airport to the city center, and police helicopters.
Members of Prodi’s center-left coalition urged the Italian premier Tuesday to address with Putin allegations of human rights violations in Russia, including attacks on journalists who write about corruption, Chechnya and other sensitive issues.
“We also discussed freedom of the press, of association, freedom of expression as founding values of all societies,” Prodi said.
Putin said “there are still many problems in Chechnya, but such democratic procedures as elections and the creation of institutional organs are under way.”
The U.S.-based Committee to Protect Journalists said 13 journalists have been killed in contract-style murders since Putin took office in 2000, including Anna Politkovskaya, a Kremlin critic who was shot dead in Moscow in October.
In Rome, Chechnya’s former health minister, Umar Khanbiyev, held a news conference with Radical Party leaders during which he denounced human rights violations in Chechnya.
“Italian politicians must tell the truth about the situation in Chechnya and especially the situation regarding human rights,” Khanbiyev was quoted as saying by the ANSA news agency.
Prodi said the contentions of the former minister was not touched upon.
In Bari, about 150 people – mostly young communists – demonstrated against Putin in a square next to the one where the meeting was being held.
Franco Venturini, an expert on Russia, urged the Italian government not to remain silent on human rights, even in the face of economic interests. “There is … a duty to be true to principles that are not negotiable,” he wrote Wednesday in a front-page editorial in Corriere della Sera.
Prodi said Rome and Moscow shared the vision of a multilateral approach to world crises, including in the Middle East, Iraq and Afghanistan.
