OREANDA-NEWS. May 21, 2010. At the St. Petersburg Summit in May 2003, the EU and Russia agreed to reinforce their cooperation by creating in the long term four ‘common spaces’ in the framework of the Partnership and Cooperation Agreement and on the basis of common values and shared interests. These cover the following issues:

The Common Economic Space, covering economic issues and the environment

The Common Space of Freedom, Security and Justice;

The Common Space of External Security, including crisis management and non-proliferation;

The Common Space of Research and Education, Including cultural aspects.

In April 2010, European Commission published the EU-Russia Common Spaces Progress Report 2009. The Research and Education section includes description of the Gate2RuBIN project.  Also, some FP7 projects are mentioned where RTTN is involved.

"In 2009, the activities of the Russian Gate2RuBIN project consortium were continued and further extended in Russian regions. Gate2RuBIN is a business and innovation network of 27 Russian regional partners operating under the EU Competitiveness and Innovation Programme Enterprise Europe Network. It aims to build partnerships between Russian and European high-tech and research-oriented SMEs, to support the participation of Russian high-tech innovative SMEs in the EU Framework Programmes, and to promote technology- and knowledge-transfer between Europe and Russia".