MOSCOW, October 5 (RIA Novosti) - The United States Olympic Committee (USOC) has offered Russia its assistance in the preparation for the 2014 Winter Olympic Games in line with a cooperation agreement with the Russian Olympics Committee.
Russia's Black Sea resort of Sochi won the right to host the 2014 Olympics at an IOC session in Guatemala in July 2007 after a close race with South Korea's Pyeongchang and Austria's Salzburg.
"It is a framework agreement, which outlines our cooperation with the USOC for the future and stipulates that the Americans are ready to actively participate in programs developed by Sochi-2014 Organizing Committee," said Viktor Khotochkin, first vice-president of the Russian Olympics Committee.
Khotochkin said on Saturday that the agreement also envisioned "exchange of sports delegations...joint fight against doping in sports and many other aspects [of cooperation]."
The agreement has been concluded for a term of five years, until 2014.
Russian business daily Vedomosti reported earlier citing data from the Ministry of Regional Development that 1.054 trillion rubles is to be spent between 2009 and 2012 on a government program for the construction of Olympic facilities in Sochi, with 699.3 billion rubles allocated from the federal budget.
Russia has never hosted the Winter Olympics and Moscow's hosting of the Summer Games in 1980 was marred by a U.S.-led boycott involving more than 60 countries.
The USOC is a non-profit organization that serves as the National Olympic Committee (NOC) for the United States and coordinates the relationship between the United States Anti-Doping Agency and the World Anti-Doping Agency and various international sports federations.
