Russian President Vladimir Putin will pay a two-day official visit to Turkey next week to further develop bilateral relations between the two countries, Turkish Foreign Ministry announced on Saturday.

Putin, who will visit Turkey from Sept. 2 to Sept. 3, will bethe first Russian leader paying an official visit to Turkey in the last 32 years.

Putin will be accompanied by Russian Foreign Minister SergeiLavrov and Defense Minister Sergei Ivanov.

His visit will be a sign of mutual confidence and dialogue which have been developing in recent years between the two countries.

Turkish sources said Turkey wanted to establish friendly and good relations based on cooperation with its all neighboring countries, adding that Turkey's basic goal was current problems should be solved peacefully

in international and regional area and the region should reach stability, confidence and prosperity.

The sources said Turkey's relations with Russia turned into a cooperation and multi-dimensional partnership rather than a competition, adding that relations would also be brought to the level of "developed" multi-dimensional partnership with Putin's coming visit.

Turkey will ask Putin to support Turkey's stance toward Cyprus issue, said the sources, adding that Russia has pursued a closer policy toward Greek Cypriots so far, but has started to balance its policy on the issue.

The trade volume between the two countries amounted to 6.8 billion US dollars in 2003, and it is expected to reach 9 billion dollars by the end of 2004.

Meanwhile, Turkish business investments in Russia amounted to 12 billion dollars, according to official figures.

There has been a great progress in tourism field between Ankaraand Moscow with a total of 1.25 million Russian tourists to Turkey in 2003. The figure is expected to reach 1.7 million by the end of this year.

The two countries are expected to sign six separate documents during Putin's visit, including "joint declaration pertaining to deepening of friendship and multi-dimensional partnership between Turkey and Russia", a military agreement and an agreement for energy cooperation.

Source: Xinhua