Russian President Dmitry Medvedev to visit India from December 20

Russian President Dmitry Medvedev will pay an official visit to India on December 20-22, the Kremlin announced today.

During his New Delhi stay Medvedev will meet with President Pratibha Patil and hold annual summit talks with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on the whole range of bilateral and international issues of mutual interest.

During the then President Vladimir Putin's India visit in October 2000, New Delhi and Moscow agreed to hold annual summits alternatively on each-other's soil.

Bilateral innovative cooperation in hi-tech areas would be high on the agenda of Medvedev's India visit

Last month, Medvedev had expressed Russia's readiness for innovative partnership with New Delhi and Beijing for "modernisation" of the Russian economy.

"We see the possibility of innovative partnership with nations like China, India in the five priority areas of Russia's modernisation," Medvedev said during his annual state of the nation address before the federal assembly.