ASTANA. June 8 (Interfax) - Russia will continue to provide assistance in training and equipping Afghan law enforcement and security agencies and in building the Afghan armed forces, Russia Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov announced Thursday.
"We have confirmed our readiness to increase the number of grants we offer to Afghans for training in Russia both in civilian professions and those needed for strengthening the law enforcement and security agencies and the armed forces of Afghanistan," Lavrov told reporters after between President Vladimir Putin and his Afghan counterpart Hamid Karzai.
"This is our contribution that we intend to make through bilateral channels to ensuring the combat efficiency and readiness of the Afghan security forces so that they could be able to control their country after the international coalition pulls out," he said.
Lavrov reminded the newsmen that about 150 Afghan enterprises had been built with the help of the Soviet Union. "Russian companies are ready start restoring them on a parity basis… We are also ready, as President Putin pointed out, to discuss new trade and economic cooperation projects".
Russian companies are already working on Afghan hydro-electric power facilities, Lavrov said. He reiterated Russia's concern to restore, in cooperation with other countries, the sites built with Soviet assistance such as the Salang tunnel, the nitrogen fertilizers in Mazar-i-Sharif, hydro-electric and thermo-electric power plants.
"The presidents instructed us, foreign ministers and economy ministers, to prepare a program of work in these directions," Lavrov said.