MOSCOW, November 13 (RIA Novosti) - Russian President Dmitry Medvedev will arrive in Stockholm on Tuesday for an EU-Russia summit to focus on energy security and a new cooperation pact, a Kremlin aide said.
Sergei Prikhodko said Medvedev's working visit would begin with an unofficial dinner with Swedish Prime Minister Fredrik Reinfeldt. The two leaders will hold bilateral talks ahead of the EU-Russia summit scheduled for Wednesday morning.
Later on Wednesday, King Charles XII will grant an audience to the Russian president.
"We hail the Swedish authorities' pragmatism and consistency, which we hope will ensure the effectiveness of both the bilateral meeting and the EU-Russia summit," Prikhodko said, adding the summit was taking place "at a critical point" when "ratification procedures of the Lisbon Treaty are being concluded."
"We welcome the reform," the Kremlin aide said.
"Much of the negotiations and discussions with the European Union will be more difficult, because they will speak with one voice, but we take it very positively," he said. "It makes dialog more difficult, but more effective."
The EU's Lisbon Treaty, now ratified by all 27 member states, will come into force on December 1.
Prikhodko said Russian and EU officials would focus on climate change, efforts to overcome the consequences of the global credit crunch and the issue of energy supplies to Europe.
"The provision of energy security is very important to us, especially taking into account the Ukrainian aspect," he said.
Russia has called on the European Union to take steps, including financial ones, to prevent problems again arising in Russian natural gas transit via Ukraine to Europe. Russian gas supplies to Europe were halted in January over a debt dispute, leaving much of Europe short of energy.
Prikhodko also said that Moscow and Brussels had already held several rounds of talks on a new partnership and cooperation agreement. The current Russia-EU agreement expired in late 2007, but was automatically extended. In early October, the sixth round of talks on the new agreement took place in Brussels.
Russia's EU envoy Vladimir Chizhov earlier said the two parties had agreed to hold the seventh round of talks in early December.
According to the Kremlin aide, Medvedev is also expected to discuss with his European colleagues a range of international issues, including North Korea's nuclear problem, the situation in Afghanistan and Pakistan, and the Cyprus and Kosovo issues.
The agenda of talks will also include the issue of European security, Prikhodko said.
Medvedev proposed in the summer of 2008 setting up an organization ensuring peace in Europe, in which no state or organization would have a monopoly.
