AKIPRESS.COM - Russian President Vladimir Putin said that the leaders of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) are grateful to Kazakhstan’s former First President Nursultan Nazarbayev for the idea of the union’s establishment and his assistance in its development.

"When [we] meet with colleagues, we always remember that this idea was yours. We are all very grateful to you for being the pioneer of the establishment of this union and its catalyst for quite a large number of years, while it was still finding its feet," Tass reported Putin as saying.

The Russian leader also assessed the development of bilateral economic relations between Russian and Kazakhstan. He stressed that even in the difficult conditions of the pandemic and the reduction of industrial output all over the world the mechanisms of cooperation operated effectively. "Suffice to say that we did not allow a grave economic decline to occur in cooperation with Kazakhstan in the most difficult year of 2020 - only 4%. In the first nine months of this year there was an increase of over 30%, and this, of course, is a very serious result of our joint activities with the current leadership of Kazakhstan," Putin concluded.