Moscow, 20 February 2008. Anatoly Chubais, President of the CIS Electric Power Council and Chairman of the Management Board of RAO "UES of Russia", and Parviz Fattah, Minister of Energy of the Islamic Republic of Iran, have signed a memorandum of understanding.

The parties acknowledge their mutual interest in cooperation in the electricity industry and express confidence that their joint projects will be major factor contributing to the development of the Caucasian/Central Asian region and in the Middle East.

They consider it a matter of highest priority to synchronize Iran's power system with those of the CIS and Baltic republics, stating that some of the interconnection lines between Iran and Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Turkmenistan, have already been completed or are under construction.

In the near future, the parties will create joint working groups to consider the possible models for synchronous operation of the energy systems in Iran, the CIS and the Baltics. Representatives of the Caucasian and Central Asian republics will be invited to participate in these groups, which is a pre-requisite for implementing the synchronous interconnection project.