Putin: Moscow, Cairo to Drop USD, Use national currencies in Bilateral Trade

Monday, 9 February 2015

Putin: Moscow, Cairo to Drop USD, Use national currencies in Bilateral Trade

Local Editor

Russian President Vladimir Putin said Moscow and Cairo might soon exclude the US dollar and use their national currencies in the settlement of accounts in bilateral trade.

In an interview with Egyptian state newspaper Al-Ahram on the eve of a two-day trip to Cairo, said the issue of abandoning the dollar in trade is “being actively discussed.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin

The Russian president was invited for a bilateral meeting by his Egyptian counterpart Abdul Fattah al-Sisi.

“This measure will open up new prospects for trade and investment cooperation between our countries, reduce its dependence on the current trends in the world markets,” Putin said.

“I should note that we already use national currencies for trade with a number of the CIS [Commonwealth of Independent States] states, and China. This practice proves its worth; we are ready to adopt it in our relations with Egypt as well. This issue is being discussed in substance by relevant agencies of both countries.”

Egypt is a long-time and trusted partner of Russia and the relationship between the two countries has been rapidly developing, the Russian president said.

“The volume of bilateral trade has increased significantly over the past years: In 2014, it increased by almost half compared to the previous year and amounted to more than $4.5 billion,” he said urging for this trend to be strengthened.

Kiev Must Stop “Punitive” Operation in E.Ukraine

On the Ukrainian crisis, Putin said Kiev must stop its military operation in east Ukraine, describing the operation as “punitive”.

Putin warned that economic pressure on regions held by separatists was a "dead-end track fraught with ... catastrophe".

"The most important condition for the stabilization of the situation is immediate cease-fire and ending of the so-called 'anti-terrorist', but in fact punitive, operation in the south-east of Ukraine," Putin told Al-Ahram before a planned summit with the leaders of France and Germany in Minsk on Wednesday.

"Kiev's attempts to exert economic pressure on Donbas (region of east Ukraine) and disrupt its daily life only aggravate the situation. This is a dead-end track, fraught with a big catastrophe," he said.

In his interview, Putin reiterated Moscow's line that the violence in east Ukraine was a reaction to a Western-supported "coup" in which protesters overthrew Moscow-ally Viktor Yanukovich from the presidency in Kiev last year.

"The ultranationalists who seized the power using military force put the country on the edge of disruption and started the fratricidal war," he said.

Russia's Deputy Foreign Minister Grigory Karasin will travel to Berlin on Monday and representatives of Russia, Ukraine, the separatists and the OSCE security watchdog are due to meet in Minsk on Tuesday before the leaders' summit the next day.

Putin has said the summit on Wednesday would take place "if by then we have managed to agree our positions".