DOHA (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 07th August, 2023) Russia and Qatar are working on joint projects amounting to over 160 billion rubles ($1.67 billion), Russian Ambassador to Doha Dmitry Dogadkin said in an interview with Sputnik.
"Our cooperation on investments is expanding. We are successfully developing our partnership with the Russian Direct Investment Fund. A number of joint projects worth more than 160 billion rubles, or 7.2 billion Qatari riyals, are being worked on," Dogadkin said.
The ambassador specified that Russia-Qatar trade had reached nearly 70 million Qatari Riyals ($19.23 million) in the first quarter of 2023.
Dogadkin noted that Moscow and Doha considered cooperation in transportation and logistics to be promising area of partnership, particularly the implementation of the International North-South Transport Corridor.
He recalled that by the end of 2022, Russian exports of food and agricultural products to Qatar had increased by over 50%.
"Agricultural cooperation has been developing consistently: deliveries of barley and sunflower oil to Qatar has been resumed. Miratorg and other major Russian suppliers of halal poultry and beef are working actively in the Qatari market, importing halal poultry there," Dogadkin added.
He also noted that Qatar, as one of the major investors in the Russian economy and one of the country's key partners in the middle East, firmly opposed sanctions against Russia over Ukraine. Despite the "colossal pressure" from the West, the two countries have remained interested in the development of bilateral relations, the ambassador said, adding that they were working, in particular, to start using national currencies in mutual trade.
Dogadkin's remarks came after Qatari Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani met with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in Moscow in June. The top diplomats discussed bilateral trade, the Ukraine conflict as well as the situations in Afghanistan, Syria, Libya and Palestine. The two officials also reaffirmed their commitment to boosting political and economic dialogue.
