MOSCOW, August 1 (RIA Novosti) - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has appointed Mikhail Shvydkoi as his special representative on international cultural cooperation, the Kremlin said on Friday.
Shvydkoi was the Russian culture minister in 2000-2004. He then headed a government agency on culture and cinematography that was abolished earlier this year.
He was born in Kyrgyzstan in 1948, and his family moved to Moscow a year after his birth. He graduated from the Russian Academy of Dramatic Art in Moscow in 1971 and subsequently worked on TV and radio.
Before being appointed deputy minister of culture in 1993, he was the general director of the Culture Ministry's "Kultura" publishing house.
Shvydkoy currently teaches the history of foreign theater at the Russian State University for the Humanities. He is also a member of the Russian Writers' Union and Journalists' Union.
