More than 40 agreements will be signed between higher education institutions of Belarus and Russia on the sidelines of the Forum of Regions, as reported by Irina Starovoitova, First Deputy Minister of Education of Belarus, during the sectional meeting "Integration of the Higher Education System of Russia and Belarus: Regional Aspect" held on the sidelines of the IX Forum of Regions of Belarus and Russia in Grodno, BELTA correspondent reports.

"Cooperation of the Republic of Belarus with Russian regions is among the priority areas of Belarusian-Russian interaction and serves as a foundation for trade, economic, scientific, technical, and socio-cultural relations. I would like to note that interaction in the educational sphere is carried out with 73 regions of the Russian Federation. Issues of bilateral cooperation in education have been discussed during 12 joint meetings of working groups on interaction between the Republic of Belarus and the regions of Russia. Priority areas of cooperation in education remain: the implementation of the youth policy of the Union State and the creation of joint youth exchange programs, enhancing the academic mobility of students, researchers, and teaching staff, further improvement and convergence of the education systems of the Union State, and the creation of a mechanism for joint accreditation of higher education institutions," said Irina Starovoitova.