H.E. ALEXANDER A. IVANOV, Russian Ambassador to Indonesia

Message from Ambassador

                      Indonesia    New Russia

The Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of the Russian Federation in the Republic of Indonesia, the Independent State of Papua New Guinea, the Republic of Kiribati and the Democratic Republic of Timor-Leste, the Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation to the Association of the South-East Asian Nation (ASEAN) 
 ИВАНОВ АЛЕКСАНДР АНАТОЛЬЕВИЧ

Чрезвычайный и Полномочный Посол Российской Федерации в Республике Индонезии и Независимом Государстве Папуа - Новая Гвинея, Республике Кирибати и Демократической Республике Восточный Тимор по совместительству, Постоянный представитель Российской Федерации при Ассоциации Государств Юго-Восточной Азии (АСЕАН)

Чрезвычайный и Полномочный Посол Российской Федерации в Республике Индонезии А.А.Иванов вручает верительные грамоты Президенту Республики Индонезии С.Б.Юдойоно в присутствии Министра иностранных дел Республики Индонезии Х.Вираюды (справа)

WHY PARTNERSHIP WITH RUSSIA MATTERS

On June 12 Russia celebrates its National day which makes the title of this article quite relevant.

Though Indonesia and Russia are quite far from each other from geographic point of view they have many things in common. Being multiethnic, polyconfessional and multicultural societies both countries recently went through painful transformation from authoritarian rule to a truly democratic system where ideology no more determines their attitude to each other and where human rights and freedoms are respected and treated as the highest value. This shift allowed to correct the foundation of bilateral relations, their nature. The interaction between the two countries became completely deideologized.

Nowadays Moscow and Jakarta are solving similar problems in their development. Both Russia and Indonesia face the challenge of promotion of religious tolerance, countering radicalism and fighting terrorism. Both countries are in the process of readjusting economy to make it work better. Both are interested in attracting foreign investments, modernizing their legal systems, fighting corruption.

Thus there is no surprise that Russia and Indonesia have similar or close views on key international issues, share approaches to major world problems ranging from conceptual like multilateralism, central role of the United Nations, non-interference, non-proliferation etc. to present day challenges: international terrorism, drug trafficking, Iraq, Middle East and other hot spots of the world politics. Both stand firmly in favor of the rule of law in international relations, peaceful and diplomatic settlement of conflicts, rejection of double standards. This solid political foundation makes us natural partners in the UN General Assembly, UN Security Council and UN Human Rights Council.

It is quite natural as well that Russia and Indonesia closely cooperate in different regional organizations. In APEC Russia and Indonesia co-sponsored an initiative on dialogue of religions and cultures. In the "ASEAN plus partners" framework Russia has just established a Russia-ASEAN Dialogue Partnership Financial Fund which aims to further promote practical ASEAN0Russia cooperation.

But it would be a mistake to reduce our cooperation to political sphere only. Russia is becoming a valuable partner for Indonesia in many other spheres. Last year we devoted primary attention to achieving a breakthrough in economic field. Progress is there: trade between two countries rose approximately 30% in 2006. But those figures could have been significantly higher. Substantial reserves exist and priority should be placed upon a trade buildup through science-extensive collaboration along with more vigorous promotion of projects in the fields of energy resources development, nuclear energy, telecommunications.

There are good prospects for our interaction in the outer space exploration. During the official visit of the President of Indonesia S.B.Yudhoyono to Russia in December last year the two sides signed the Intergovernmental Agreement on Cooperation in the Field of Exploration and the Use of Outer Space for Peaceful Purposes. Further collaboration is envisaged for the implementation of "Air-Launch" project on Biak island.

Military-technical cooperation is another promising area of our collaboration. In terms of armaments and military equipment, Russia possesses exactly what the Indonesian government would like to buy to strengthen its defense capability, with reliable quality, reasonable prices and favorable financial terms. The state of Russian economy affords to satisfy the Indonesian request for considerable state credit. The important aspect in this and other spheres of our cooperation is that Russia has no hidden political agenda in its approaches to dealing with Indonesia.

Further potential exists in a disaster prevention and management cooperation between two countries. Last year Russian amphibious aircrafts BE-200 were used in forest fire-fighting in Sumatra and Kalimantan.

What inspires me is the growth of business-to-business contacts between two countries. Russian joint stock company "Gazprom" established direct contacts with "BHP Migas", our biggest aluminum company "Rusal" is interested in cooperation with Indonesian partners, Russian oil company "Lukoil" signed MoU with Pertamina.

Another positive trend is that a number of Russian tourists visiting Indonesia gradually and steadily grow from year to year. In 2006 more than 36 thousand Russian tourists visited Indonesia and during first three months of this year approximately 13 thousand have already been here. This fact positively impacts the development of this sector of Indonesian economy.

In June the 4th meeting of the Russian-Indonesian Joint Commission on Trade, Economic and Technical Cooperation will be held in Indonesia. I hope it will help us to further define the avenues of our future cooperation as well as to check the implementation of joint projects already under way. Another event that pursued the goal of promotion of Russian producers was the Day of Russian Technologies held in Jakarta in 14-15 May, 2007.

In relations with Indonesia we do not look for any unilateral privileges or advantages. This principle we apply to our relations with any country in the world. Our credo is mutually beneficial partnership in all the spheres. You may have noticed that in the Asia vector of Russian foreign policy drastic, positive and constructive changes took place during the last decade. We carry out in practice a multidimensional foreign policy and give the same importance to relations with western and eastern partners. If from statistic point of view to count the number of visits of our president to the eastern and western countries we will get approximately the same result. We see the future of the Asian region built upon the foundation of collective efforts in the sphere of security and economic cooperation. For us there is no "large" or "small", "more important" and "less important" partners here. It is our firm belief that all the countries in the region have equal rights for the participation in the construction of the common "Asian home".

Coming back to Indonesia this philosophy is reinforced by another factor - friendly relations between our countries and peoples, mutual attraction to each other which has a long history. 

That is why cooperation with Russia really matters. The forthcoming visit of the Russian President Vladimir Putin to Indonesia scheduled later this year is another proof of that. We hope that it will become very logical continuation of our cooperation in all spheres.

Серебро: Журавли (subtitle in Russian/English)

"Праздничный концерт", Февраля 2008

http://serebro.su/

The song was chosen by Serebro to satisfy the patriotic song requirement when they entered the competition to represent Russia to compete in the Eurovision Contest 2007 in Helsinki. Serebro won the competition and represented Russia. At the Eurovision Contest 2007, Serebro received the third place for Russia with the song "Song #1".

This is a well known Soviet song, it is emotionally sad and it has always brought people into tears.