Chairman of the Russian Senate officially visits Vietnam

At the invitation of National Assembly Chairman Nguyen Sinh Hung, on the afternoon of November 13, a high-ranking delegation of the Federation Council (Upper House) of the Russian Federation Parliament led by Chairwoman Valentina Ivanovna Matviyenko arrived in Hanoi, beginning an official visit to Vietnam from November 13-14, 2012.

Ms. Valentina Ivanovna Matviyenko, Chairwoman of the Federation Council of Russia.
(Photo: VNA)

Valentina Ivanovna Matviyenko was accompanied by senior officials of the Federation Council. They were: Mr. Umakhanov, Deputy Chairman of the Federation Council; Vladimir Mikhailovich Dzhabarov, First Deputy Chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee; Bato-Zhargal Zhambalnimbuev, Member of the Budget and Financial Market Committee; Andrey Yurievich Molchanov, Chairman of the Economic Policy Committee; Valeriy Vasilievich Loshinin, Assistant to the Chairman of the Federation Council and Ms. Natalia Timofeevna Udalova, Head of the Secretariat of the Chairman of the Federation Council.

Accompanying Chairwoman of the Russian Federation Council Valentina Ivanovna Matviyenko was the Russia-Vietnam Friendship Parliamentarians' Group led by Mr. Viktor Kosourov, First Deputy Chairman of the Committee on Science, Education, Culture and Information Policy, and Chairman of the Group.

Ms. Valentina Ivanovna Matvienko was born in 1949 in Ukraine. She is a chemical-pharmaceutical engineer; once worked in the Lenin Komsomol Communist Youth Union; and served as First Secretary of the Krasnogvardeiskiy District Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union.

In 1989, she was elected a People's Representative of the USSR, Chairman of the Committee of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on Women, Family Protection, Motherhood and Children. She also served as Ambassador of the Soviet Union and the Russian Federation to the Republic of Malta; Deputy Prime Minister of the Government of the Russian Federation, in charge of the social sector. In 2003, she was appointed Plenipotentiary Representative of the President of the Russian Federation in the North-Western Federal District, and was elected Governor of Saint Petersburg in 2006.

In September 2011, she was elected Chairwoman of the Federation Council of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation.

Ms. Valentina Ivanovna Matviyenko has been awarded state awards, including the Order of Honor, the Order of the Red Banner of Labor, the Order of Merit for the Fatherland, the Order of the Legion of Honor, First Class, the Order of Friendship between Peoples, etc./.

According to (TTXVN)-LT