Saturday, January 1 2005 16:02 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Moscow: Moscow's ties with India and China will 'develop upwards' in the New Year, a senior Russian official said today (Jan 1, 2004).

"The outcome of Russia's dialogue with India and China in the last year can be characterised as impressive," Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Alexeyev said.

He attributed this to the 'intensive contacts' at high and highest level between Moscow and New Delhi and Moscow and Beijing.

According to him, as a result of these contacts Russian-Indian and Russian-Chinese relations have significantly advanced in many directions of bilateral cooperation.

"We hope, and its not groundless, that the upward movement will continue in the New Year 2005," Alexeyev was quoted as saying by ITAR-TASS.

He said that the Indo-Russian inter-departmental working group on countering international terrorism is to hold its regular session on January 18-19 in Moscow.

The highest-level political contacts will continue, when the leaders of India and China are scheduled to visit Moscow to attend the 60th anniversary celebrations of victory over Nazi Germany in World War-II.

"In our opinion, the Moscow-New Delhi -Beijing relationship in trilateral format has real prospects, including in the field of economy," Alexeyev said.

Foreign ministers of the three countries are scheduled to hold another informal meeting this year. As part of track-two diplomacy the scholars and experts are to hold their conference in Shanghai and the trilateral joint business council is to meet in New Delhi.