Islam Karimov said that large transnational companies of Russia such as LUKOIL, Gazprom, VimpelCom, MTS and other companies are successfully operating in Uzbekistan.

President Islam Karimov said that the volume of Russian investments into economy of Uzbekistan made up over US$8 billion in last 15 years.

Uzbek leader said that Russia is important trade partner of Uzbekistan. Russia accounts about 25% of foreign trade turnover of Uzbekistan and half of foreign trade turnover of Uzbekistan with the CIS states. He said that trade turnover between two states exceeded US$7 billion. There are about 900 Uzbek-Russian enterprises, including 150 enterprises with 100% Russian investments, President said.

At the same time, President of Russia Vladimir Putin said that the volume of Russian investments into Uzbekistan exceeded US$6 billion.

Russian leader said: “Russia is a key business partner for Uzbekistan. As Mr Karimov just mentioned, Russia accounts for nearly a third of Uzbekistan’s foreign trade. Russian investment has grown to more than $6 billion over the last five years. Our bilateral trade continues its steady growth and last year reached a figure of US$4 billion. It increased by 8% over January-September this year and came to more than US$3 billion. This is a positive trend despite the external situation”.

“LUKOIL, for example, together with its Uzbekistani partners, is developing a group of gas-condensate deposits in the Bukhara region. This project is planned over a timeframe through to 2039, with up to $5 billion invested over this time. There are also plans to build a large gas treatment plant with capacity to process 8 billion cubic metres of gas a year,” Vladimir Putin underlined.

“Gazprom is also building up its activities. Over recent years, Gazprom has invested US$390 million in geological exploration. This has already produced some real results, such as the opening of the Dzhel natural gas field, which has reserves of 6.4 billion cubic metres. This will certainly increase Uzbekistan’s potential not just in gas production but in the energy sector in general,” Russian head said.