Meanwhile, Russian President Vladimir Putin was meeting his Finnish counterpart Tarja Halonen on Sunday for talks expected to focus on regional and economic issues including transport and the environment.

Putin met Halonen at Pushkin, formerly Tsarskoye Selo, near Saint Petersburg, after saying farewell to U.S. President George W.

Bush, Itar-Tass news agency reported.

Bush flew out of Russia's second city on sunday at the close of a four-day visit during which the two presidents signed a key disarmament treaty and concluded a strategic partnership agreement.

Foreign Ministry spokesman Alexander Yakovenko said the Russian and Finnish presidents would focus on areas of concern for their adjacent border regions, including environmental protection, agriculture and forestry projects, transport and telecommunications.

Specific projects to be discussed included a high-speed rail connection between Saint Petersburg and Helsinki and the restoration of the seaway linking Saint Petersburg, Finland and the Baltic states, Itar-Tass quoted Yakovenko as saying.

In March Finnish Prime Minister Paavo Lipponen visited Russia to discuss a European Union project called the "northern dimension", designed to develop commercial and economic cooperation between Finland, the Baltic states and the northwestern regions of Russia.

The European Commission, the EU's executive arm, decided in February to allocate 28 million euros ($24.4 million) to Finland to spend on the "Karelia" program to develop business and tourism and create 800 jobs on the Finnish-Russian border.

Russo-Finnish trade totalled $5.7 billion in 2001, Itar-Tass said, quoting official figures.