Putin enticed investors to invest in Russia's Far East

Russian President Vladimir Putin persuaded investors on Friday, domestic and foreign, to aid the development of Russia's great Far East region by promising high returns and reassuring Asia-Pacific economies about their strategic importance as reported by Reuters.

Putin spoke at the Eastern Economic Forum in the city of Vladivostok, his initiated event, and told his government to increase its efforts to develop the region.

"(We) will provide to investors the best conditions to do business so the Far East of Russia can successfully compete in terms of efficiency and return on capital with leading business centres," Putin told participants at the inaugural forum.

He also added that Russia's largest oil firm, Rosneft, will invest 1.3 trillion roubles ($19.56 billion) in projects in the region.

Russia's Far East covering the extreme part of Russia between Lake Baikal in Eastern Siberia and the Pacific Ocean, is abundant in natural resources, including forestry and fish stocks.

Putin was chiefly seeking an alliance with Chinese, Korean and Japanese investors in Vladivostok after Moscow's relations had declined with the West following the Ukraine crisis. Since then, Russia turned East and began seeking economic, political, and military cooperation.

He ordered the creation of the forum in May encouraging new investments in the region. Russian officials say they want to attract investors from China, Japan and South Korea to develop the region's economic potential and deepen trade ties with the Asia-Pacific region, as reported by the Wall Street Journal.

"The Far East is open for everybody who is ready to cooperate," Mr. Putin said.

He followed his speech visiting a showpiece project, the under-construction Primo Sky Aquarium, with members of a Chinese delegation and the actor Steven Seagal in tow.

Russia's finance ministry has expected the economy will not get back to growth until late 2015 or next year.

The Russian government already made economic ties with China to reducing its dependence on energy exports to Europe. Another reason is Moscow's relation with the west is at post-Cold War low from the time Crimea was annexed last year.

Ever since, Russia is hesitant to allow Chinese firms to take stakes in strategic hydrocarbon deposits. But at an earlier time in the forum, the Russian state energy titan OAO Rosneft, declared that state-owned China Petrochemical Corp. will have a stake in two oil fields.

"A market of this potential size doesn't exist anywhere else, in terms of the size of the territory or natural-resource potential," said Russian Deputy Prime Minister Yury Trutnev, Mr. Putin's emissary to the Far Eastern Federal Region, ahead of the forum. "There isn't anything else like it on the planet."