OREANDA-NEWS. On July 13, 2007 the State Hermitage Museum signed the general agreement for cooperation with BDO Unicon, an audit and consulting company, reported the press-centre of BDO Unicon.

Under the agreement, BDO Unicon is an official consultant to the State Hermitage Museum and provides support services on a number of national and international projects using BDO International network resources.

Cooperation covers such issues as creation of special purpose charitable capital, use of charitable foundations and other activities of the Museum for raising funds for its development.

BDO Unicon provides protection of interests of the State Hermitage Museum with regard to customs processing and bidding. It is known that Russian legislation doesn't take into account specific character of Museum activities in these areas.

General Director of BDO Unicon in St. Petersburg and Advisor to Culture and Mass Communications Minister of the RF Zorina Myskova said, "Expertise and experience of BDO Unicon in support of federal cultural heritage objects including those in St. Petersburg enables us to provide professional assistance to the State Hermitage Museum for the purpose of maintenance of the best samples of Russian culture and unquestioned masterpiece works of world art."

"BDO Unicon willingly assists the State Hermitage Museum in resolving urgent matters related to specific character of its operations under the effective legislation, and it is an excellent opportunity to show how positive tendencies have been increased in our society," said Mikhail Piotrovsky, the Director of the State Heritage Museum.

"It is a great honour for us to work in cooperation with the State Hermitage Museum. Provision of support for culture and art is the part of BDO Unicon mission. I hope that our mutual work will significantly contribute to maintenance of age-long traditions of Russian and world art," said Andrey Dubinsky, the General Director of BDO Unicon.