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Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Tuesday that Russia will supply South Africa with nuclear fuel up to 2010.

The visiting Russian president made the statement at a news conference at Tuynhuys, Cape Town.

Flanked by President Thabo Mbeki, he told journalists that a Russian company was planning to invest US$1 billion in production of manganese in this country.

Putin also said that Russian companies were interested in contributing to power generation capacity and were also interested in an aluminum smelter project.

Putin emphasized that he was not in the country simply for "political tourism", but to strengthen the business relationship between the two countries.

He said that his country was also looking at the "possible supplies" of liquefied natural gas to South Africa.

Putin, who is accompanied by a large business delegation and with cabinet leaders from his country, said Russia was interested in the long-term projects connected with the extraction of metals and metal ores.

Mbeki meanwhile said that an agreement signed connected to cooperation with space technology would see the country launching "micro satellites" in December this year using Russian Federation rockets "so we are going to have things in outer space ... which help us to catch up with the rest of the world".

Mbeki said that Russia would assist South Africa in areas of medical research and the training of medical personnel in that country.

In an interview published on the eve of Putin's arrival, South African Foreign Minister Nkosazana Dlamini-Zuma said co-operation with Russia would enable Africa to "have its voice heard" on international matters.

"We hope to develop our relations in the aerospace, energy and military-industrial spheres," she told the Russian newspaper Rossiskaya Gazeta.

The volume of bilateral trade has grown steadily in recent years, with South Africa exporting around US$130 million worth of goods to Russia in 2004. 

Zwelethu Jolobe, a lecturer in international affairs at the University of Cape Town, said Putin's visit would be a chance for Moscow to forge closer ties with a natural ally that it has neglected in the recent past.

"It's quite clear that for a long time, since the time of the Soviet bloc, Russia's relations with Africa and Latin America have been neglected."

(Xinhua News Agency, China Daily September 6, 2006)