Russian ambassador denies claims of decrease in Russian-Venezuelan contacts

MOSCOW, April 7. /TASS/. Moscow and Caracas remain in regular contact and continue developing bilateral projects, there has been no reduction of ties, Russian Ambassador to Venezuela Sergey Melik-Bagdasarov told TASS in an interview, commenting on Western media reports. "We continue to maintain regular communication with Venezuelan authorities," the diplomat noted. "So, the talk of any decrease in contacts is unfounded," he said. He recalled that Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and his Venezuelan counterpart Yvan Gil Pinto had recently exchanged congratulatory messages on the occasion of the 81st anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations. "In early March, special envoy of the Russian foreign minister for Latin America and the Caribbean, head of the Foreign Ministry’s Latin American Department Alexander Shchetinin visited Caracas, where he was received by Foreign Minister Yvan Gil. He also held other meetings. Recently, I have met several times with authorized President Delcy Rodriguez, with Foreign Minister Gil and with heads of a number of agencies, with whom we discussed the development of bilateral projects," the ambassador said.