(5 Dec 2006)
1. Wide shot exterior of the Kremlin
2. Russian President Vladimir Putin entering room, shakes hands with Italian Foreign Minister Massimo D'Alema and other officials
3. Cutaway of cameraman
4. Wide shot of Putin and Russian delegation sitting down at table
5. Close-up Putin
6. Medium shot Italian delegation
7. Wide shot of roundtable
8. Medium shot Italian delegation
9. Cutaway of media
10. Wide shot of roundtable
STORYLINE:
Russian President Vladimir Putin met with Italy's Foreign Minister Massimo D'Alema in Moscow on Tuesday but neither official raised the poisoning death of a former KGB agent in public remarks.
D'Alema and Putin spoke of trade and bilateral relations before they went behind closed doors at the Kremlin.
The meeting followed broader talks under the aegis of an intergovernmental commission aimed to promote economic cooperation.
D'Alema, had said on Monday that he would ask that Russia provide "full cooperation" to help Britain investigate the poisoning death of Alexander Litvinenko's November 23 death, during his one-day visit to Moscow.
He had added that Italy was also affected by the affair.
But in remarks with reporters present at the start of the meeting, neither D'Alema nor Putin mentioned the investigation into Litvinenko's death in London.
Mario Scaramella, an Italian security expert who met with Litvinenko on the day he said he believed he was poisoned, is in a London hospital after doctors detected traces of polonium-210, the radioactive isotope believed to have killed Litvinenko, in his body.
The Kremlin denied Litvinenko's deathbed accusation that Putin was behind his poisoning, calling accusations of involvement by Russia's leadership nonsense.
Scaramella has said he told Litvinenko when they met November 1 that an e-mail he received from a source named the purported killers of journalist and Kremlin critic Anna Politkovskaya, who was fatally shot in her Moscow apartment bloc on October 7.
The e-mail reportedly said Scaramella and Litvinenko also were on a hit list.
Scaramella worked as a consultant for an Italian parliamentary commission that examined cases of past KGB infiltration in Italy.
British investigators arrived in Moscow on Monday, and Putin has pledged Russia's cooperation with the British probe.
Russia's state-controlled monopoly OAO Gazprom and Italy's biggest oil and gas company, Eni SpA, signed a deal last month that will allow Gazprom to sell gas directly in Italy starting next year.
Gazprom agreed to extend its gas supplies to Italy through 2035.
Russia now supplies nearly half of Europe's gas needs, raising concern about its increasing clout, and has annoyed the European Union by refusing to ratify an energy charter that would broaden foreign access to its oil and gas deposits and export pipelines.
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