Sierra Leone and Russia are discussing cooperation in peaceful nuclear energy, including the possibility of constructing a nuclear power plant in the West African country, according to reports.
The plan was announced on Tuesday, 7th May, 2024 at a news conference in Moscow after Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov met his Sierra Leonean counterpart, Timothy Musa Kabba.
Lavrov also said that Moscow will re-open its embassy in Sierra Leone by the end of the year.
At the beginning of the negotiations with Lavrov, Minister Kabba conveyed in Russian the condolences of President Dr. Julius Maada Bio on the terrorist attack in Crocus City Hall.
Acting Russian Foreign Minister said that he discussed joint projects in the fields of energy and mining during negotiations with Minister Kabba.
“We discussed the prospects and directions of our bilateral cooperation. We paid special attention to projects that are currently being discussed between the relevant departments in the field of energy and mining,” Lavrov said at a joint press conference with his counterpart from Sierra Leone.
He added that Freetown also has an interest in cooperation with Moscow in the healthcare sector.
Lavrov also stated that Russia plans to open an embassy in Sierra Leone this year. Aleksey Klimov, the head of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s consular department, said earlier that Moscow planned to open a diplomatic mission in the country.
Sierra Leone Foreign Minister, Timothy Musa Kabba said: “It was a great pleasure to be a guest of Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov of the Russian Federation, in Moscow, today. We discussed the strengthening of our existing 62 years bilateral relations and our continued principled cooperation on global issues”.
In August, the Ambassador of Sierra Leone to Russia, Mohamed Yongawo, told Sputnik that Freetown would very much like to establish a partnership with Russia’s Rosgeologia organisation.
In September, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the African state, Timothy Kabba, said in an interview with Sputnik that Sierra Leone had concluded a memorandum of mutual understanding with the Rosgeologia organisation in the field of geophysical and geochemical research.
Kabba also invited the Russian company Alrosa to study its possibilities in the field of diamond mining in Sierra Leone after the lifting of sanctions imposed by Western countries.
