DUSHANBE, October 24, 2008, Asia-Plus  -- Dushanbe Mayor Mahmadsaid Ubaidullyev yesterday met with delegation of St Petersburg led by Pavel Pankratov, the head of the employment department within the St Petersburg mayor office.  

Speaking in an interview with Asia-Plus, Shavkat Saidov, a spokesman for the Dushanbe mayor, said that in the course of the talks the sides had discussed issues related toe expansion of cooperation between the two cities in economic, social and cultural spheres.  Protection of rights of Tajik labor migrants working in St Petersburg was one of major topics of the meeting. 

St Petersburg is Dushanbe’s sister city in Russia, and Pankratov proposed to hold Days of Pt Petersburg in Dushanbe and Days of Dushanbe in Petersburg next year on occasion of the 10th anniversary of signing of the town twinning agreement between the two cites.  He suggested that those events should be regular, the spokesman said.