On December 9, 2015, the World Trade Center, aided by the Russian Chamber of Commerce and Industry, organized a meeting of Italian corporate members of the Italian-Russian Chamber of Commerce (IRCC) with Sergei Lavrov, Foreign Minister of the Russian Federation.
Greeting speeches were delivered by Sergei Katyrin, President of Russia’s CCI, and by Rosario Alessandrello, President of the IRCC. 

The head of the Russian chamber stressed the fact that Russian and Italian businesses regard the consent of the Russian foreign minister to the meeting as a sign of attention on the part of the foreign ministry’s leadership and of the Russian Government to the subject of the Russo-Italian trade and economic cooperation, as a recognition of the achievements of the business communities of the two countries in the promotion of relations between Russia and Italy.

Sergei Katyrin said that on the same day Russia’s CCI held a signing ceremony for a trilateral Memorandum of Cooperation between the Chamber of Commerce and Industry of the Russian Federation, the Italian-Russian Chamber of Commerce and the Agency for the Promotion of Italian Companies Abroad. 

The president of the Russian CCI said the document had the significance of a declaration of intent of Russian and Italian businesses to promote and enlarge Russo-Italian trade and economic cooperation, with support provided by a respectable Italian government entity well-known in Russia.

Mr. Katyrin also stressed that Russian businesses rate very highly the attitude of the IRCC to the anti-Russian sanction. The chamber, on behalf of its members, voiced an unambiguously negative attitude, and turned to Italy’s supreme authorities, calling on them to take all possible measures for the cancelation of those sanctions as soon as possible. The position of the IRCC was officially backed by the National Italian Confederation of Industrialists, as the mouthpiece of the collective opinion of the entire Italian business community.
In his greeting address, Rosario Alessandrello said that Italian businesses have long-standing traditions of trading with Russia, which go back to the times of Kievan Rus, when Venetian merchants used to export Russian furs. 

The president of the IRCC emphasized that amidst complications in the relations between Russia and the EU not one Italian businessman had left Russia or had abandoned their projects. Private investors do not pull out their allocations; on the contrary, new investment opportunities are emerging now, taking into account, inter alia, the profitable currency exchange rate.
Sergei Lavrov said in his speech that the two parties continue to carry out Russo-Italian economic projects, such as production of the Sukhoi-SuperJet-100 medium-range aircraft and its promotion into global markets, production of the Augusta-Westland helicopters in Russia, upgrade of Russia’s tire factories — a project in which Pirelli is involved. The minister said that in the economic sector many issues had accumulated that require discussion and resolution at the intergovernmental level. In that respect, he noted, there is an increasing demand for the Russian-Italian Council for Economic, Industrial, Currency and Finance Cooperation to resume its activities; its most recent session took place in Moscow in December 2012.

Mr. Lavrov also described and analyzed in detail the current political situation in the world, Russia’s positions on the key issues of international politics. The minister answered many questions of Italian businessmen.