Joint fund on hunt for investment opportunity (2)

Fund: 'Russia focuses on countries with potential'

Dmitriev is a member of a Russian state delegation led by Russian First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov that visited Beijing last month to follow up President Xi Jinping's first official visit to Russia.

"The whole idea of Russia and China working together is not just a myth. It's a reality and obviously there is increasing investment to grow," he said.

Total investment by China Investment Corporation in Russia was $5.6 billion in 2012, about 90 percent of that invested in the last year, he said.

On his trip, Dmitriev met presidents of the "Big Four" Chinese commercial banks, all of which have opened subsidiaries in Russia.

"We want to have some agreements with them to provide financing support for the projects we do. ... Just very natural cooperation, we bring some deals to them, we can provide some equity and they can do some debts," he said.

Russia's swinging investment policies have previously hampered some Chinese investors' efforts in exploring the Russian market.

There was resistance from some of the governors and local business people, but things are changing because Russia and China are closer politically, he said.

Also, local governors were told by Putin they would be judged by their capacity to attract investment into their regions.

"Nobody is doubting Russia will grow, but people say it's also a risky place to invest. What we are trying to do is to reduce risks of investors," he said.

"Russia is focusing on countries that have growth potential. In a world where Europe is declining and other countries are having issues, Russia is focusing on the Asia-Pacific region. We really want to find synergy by growing with other Asian countries," he said.

Bilateral trade between China and Russia hit a record $88.16 billion in 2012, up 11.2 percent year-on-year. By comparison, trade between China and the United States was $484.68 billion in the same year. But China and Russia set a goal to raise their bilateral trade volume to $100 billion by 2015 and $200 billion by 2020.

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