(Prensa Latina) - "Venezuela's President Hugo Chávez exhorted to join efforts to improve economic links with Russia in a stage of larger deepening and diversification.

The Venezuelan president was welcomed at the Russian Chamber of Commerce and Industry by the institution's president Yevgueni Primakov and representatives of the managerial sector.

Chávez called to increase the presence of Russian companies in extracting and refining hydrocarbons.

'We need to produce our raw material, gas and oil, to accelerate the construction of telecommunications, roads, food production and construction of machineries,' Chávez said.

With Vladimir Putin he discussed creating a bi-national investment fund and collaboration in gas, in which the Russian monopoly participates in perforation works in the Caribbean Sea and Petrochemistry.

A delegation of Venezuelan businessmen and experts are expected to travel to Moscow in September led by the country's vice president to identify strategy for the forthcoming inter-governmental commission, slated for October in Caracas, Chávez said".