During his visit to Hungary Mr Zubkov conducted talks with Hungarian Prime Minister Gordon Bajnai and took part in the fifth meeting of the Russian-Hungarian Intergovernmental Commission on Economic Cooperation.

Based on the results of the visit, Mr Zubkov and Hungarian Finance Minister Peter Oszko signed a protocol for the commission's meeting. Spokesmen for Gazprom and the Hungarian Development Bank signed an agreement on designing, financing and building the Hungarian section of the South Stream pipeline in the presence of Mr Zubkov and Mr Bajnai.

Speaking about the results of the visit Mr Zubkov said, in part:

Today we have completed genuinely constructive and most important, productive talks on Russian-Hungarian economic cooperation.

These talks started yesterday at a meeting with Prime Minister Gordon Bajnai and continued today at the plenary session of the Intergovernmental Commission on Economic Cooperation.

The main result is that we have made considerable progress in implementing major bilateral and multilateral projects.

This primarily applies to Europe's energy security. The agreement, which has just been signed by Gazprom and the Hungarian Development Bank, completes the institutional package of documents regarding the construction of the South Stream gas pipeline through Hungarian territory. I would like to emphasize that this is a real project that is provided with real resources.

A joint project to build and operate enormous underground gas storage facilities on Hungarian territory is another important element of our bilateral energy cooperation. It is moving forward at a quick pace.

Our cooperation on nuclear energy has good prospects. We hope to continue cooperation on the Paksh nuclear power plant. Russia's new technology is a reliable foundation for continued cooperation, including the efforts to expand the plant.

We have spoken about investment cooperation. We will continue supporting Hungary's investment in the Russian economy, including its strategic oil and financial sectors and priority national projects. I am also convinced that there is demand for Russian investment in the Hungarian economy which can facilitate Hungary's development.

As we have said today, our governments must create a favourable climate for this.

Interest in promoting industrial cooperation deserves special attention and support. Russian companies are interested in projects to modernise the metro in Budapest. We have done a good deal of groundwork in agricultural and power engineering.

We have also coordinated decisions for an early recovery of Malev Airlines. I am confident that our cooperation will allow us to retain Malev as the Hungarian national airline.

These are just some of the issues we have discussed these past two days. We have many opportunities for further cooperation.

I would like to thank Prime Minister Bajnai and Finance Minister Peter Oszko for their substantive work.

During his stay in Budapest, Viktor Zubkov also met with Viktor Orban, chairman of the leading opposition party FIDESZ.