19:58, 04 May 2009 | GMT +5
Kazakh, Russian Presidents held phone talks
ASTANA-AKORDA. May 4. KAZINFORM President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayyev and Russian Federation President Dmitry Medvedev have held a phone conversation at the initiative of the Russian party.

The two presidents discussed the topical issues of the bilateral relations and interaction within the Shanghai Cooperation Organization the summit of which is to be held in mid June this year in Yekaterinburg, the presidential press service reports.
During the phone talks the two leaders particularly dwelled upon the issues of setting up a Customs Union between Kazakhstan, Russia and Byelorussia. As of today the parties have agreed on 88% of commodity items within the Single Customs Tariff, the remaining part being arranged. The parties are also negotiating access of Kazakhstani goods to the Russian transport infrastructure, including oil-and-gas pipelines.
The heads of the two states exchanged information on accession of Kazakhstan and Russian to the WTO and agreed on coordination of this process.
N. Nazarbayev and D. Medvedev also decided to urge their governments to continue the negotiating process on all abovementioned issues.