The Russian Information Agency Novosti begins hotline coverage for Friday, January 23, 2004.
KIEV
* Russian President Vladimir Putin will arrive in Ukraine on a two-day routine visit at an invitation from his Ukrainian counterpart Leonid Kuchma.
MOSCOW
* The Russian Government House will host a meeting of the Russian part of the Russo-Brazilian commission on trade and economic cooperation. The meeting will focus on bilateral issues, in particular, the use of space for peaceful purposes.
* Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov will hold talks with his French counterpart Dominique de Villepin, currently on a routine visit to Moscow.
* The board of the Russian Railways joint stock company will hold a meeting to sum up the results of its work in 2003 and to outline tasks on stable work of railway transport in 2004.
* A plenary meeting of the State Duma will be held in Moscow.
The deputies will outline their legislative activities for the spring session of 2004. They will consider changes in the staff of several State Duma committees and the election of first deputy and deputy chairmen of the committees.
* The Russian Information Agency Novosti will host a press conference with director of the International Institute of Humanitarian-political Research, chairman of the Public Council of Russian-Ukrainian Cooperation Vyacheslav Igrunov on the topic "Prospects for the development of Russian-Ukrainian relations in the light of the Russian President's visit to Ukraine".
* A youth-patriotic action "The Memory Train Dedicated to the 60th Anniversary of the Raising of Leningrad's Blockade" will start at the Leningrad railway station. Representatives of Moscow's children and youth associations, veterans of the Great Patriotic War, Leningrad's defenders and people who lived in the blockaded city will go by the Memory Train from Moscow to St. Petersburg.
ASTANA
* A two-day international scientific-practical conference "Kazakh-Russian cooperation in the 21st century and globalization changes" will open as part of Russia's Year in Kazakhstan. Politicians, public figures and scientists from Kazakhstan, Russia, the USA, England and France are expected to participate in the conference.
DAVOS /SWITZERLAND/
* Russian Vice Premier, Finance Minister Alexei Kurdin will be participating in the World Economic Forum. Kudrin is scheduled to meet with his colleagues and heads of some foreign companies on Friday and Saturday.
MADRID
Russian Vice Premier Viktor Khristenko will participate in the 4th session of the Russian-Spanish mixed intergovernmental commission on economic and industrial cooperation.
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