JAKARTA: Indonesia’s President-elect Prabowo Subianto has said that his upcoming government would maintain relations with “great friend” Russia following meeting President Vladimir Putin, saying that he hoped for stronger cooperation on energy, defense, and education.
Prabowo, who is presently defense minister, is set to take over the office of the President from Joko Widodo in October. He is currently on a visit to Moscow and also met Russian President Putin on Wednesday. In a statement, he said that they considered Russia as a great friend.
“I would like to continue to maintain and improve the relations with Russia. In our history we also remember Moscow has always helped us in many areas when we were in difficult situations.” Prabowo expressed his intention to continue a cooperation in defense and nuclear energy, and to send students to Russia to study especially in medicine.
The visit to Russia comes months following Prabowo went to China to meet President Xi Jinping to affirm Indonesia’s “policy of friendship” with Beijing. Prabowo said he would forge relations with any nation, be it China or the US, in his non-alignment foreign policy.
According to Russian media, Putin said Moscow was ready to “scale up supplies of agricultural products, executive investment projects in the field of transport, energy, and infrastructure.”
Earlier, Prabowo suggested a peaceful settlement for the conflict in Ukraine that includes a truce and a demilitarized zone in an address to the Shangri-La Dialogue security summit in Singapore
