April 2, 2013. Valentina Matvienko, the Speaker for the Russian Soviet of the Federation, and Deputy Chairman of the Russian State Duma Alexander Zhukov assured the BIE inspection committee members on March 29 that there existed total and unanimous political agreement as to promoting Yekaterinburg as the candidate city for hosting EXPO exhibition in 2020.

Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Evgeny Kuivashev took part in the Moscow meetings, Governor of Sverdlovsk Region’s Information Policies Department reports,

‘You’ve already meet all of Russia’s political leaders and can now be sure that this is not just a formal application but a very strong wish to host such an important international event. We have total political agreement of all the political parties, chambers of the Parliament, and branches of power on this point,’ Matvienko said.

According to the Speaker, the Soviet has been promoting Russia’s EXPO application for a year now.