MOSCOW - Russian President Vladimir Putin said Thursday during talks with EU Commission chief Jose Manuel Barroso that Moscow hoped to patch up strained relations with Europe.
"I am very thankful to you for finding an opportunity to come here in the run-up to the May 10 summit," Putin told Barroso during their Kremlin talks.
"I think that the meeting is timely," he said. "On the common economic space, security issues and the humanitarian sphere, work has been progressing at the level and pace which we have agreed upon earlier."
Barroso for his part replied that Europe hoped to make the coming Russia-EU summit "a success."
Relations between the two sides have been strained over the issue of Kaliningrad -- a Russian Baltic enclave whose residents now require special documents to travel back to the mainland following the European Union's expansion.
Moscow and the European Union have also come to blows over the future of Ukraine, where an Orange Revolution last year led to the toppling of the pro-Russian regime.
04/21/2005 15:32 GMT