Culture talks for U.S. Russia

Press, 12 July 1984, Page 18

Culture talks for U.S. Russia

NZPA-AP Washington The United States and the Soviet Union will begin talks this (northern) summer aimed at renewing official exchanges of Soviet and American art, orchestras, ballet companies, athletic teams, and scientists, says the United States State Department. The announcement followed up the decision by Washington and Moscow late in June to extend for 10 years an agreement to facilitate economic, industrial, and technical co-operation. Mr Alan Romberg, the department’s deputy spokesman, said the United States already had presented a

draft text of a new cultural and scientific exchange agreement for the Soviets to consider prior to the talks. Formal negotiations were expected to begin soon, Mr Romberg said. Ambassador Arthur Hartman would conduct the talks for the United States. President Reagan indicated his interest in resuming talks on the cultural exchange agreement late in June. The exchange programme expired in 1980. Negotiations to renew it had been suspended by the then president, Mr Jimmy Carter, in 1979 after the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan.