During 1994, Japan hosted visits by some 300 representatives from central and local governments, private enterprises and academic institutions in Rus sia, and also sent about 130 Japanese consultants to Russia. The Fun d is used mainly to finance capital investments in Russian private industry through equity finance and to provide skills and know-how related to implementation of capital investments. The transition from the old regime has generated a number of economic and social problems in Russia. When the heavy earthquake took place on the northern part of Sakhlin in May 1995, Japan decided to provide humanitarian assistance amounting to 125 million yen and delivered assistance to Sakhlin over six times. Japan also received 4 Russian children to a Japanese hospital who were seriously injured by the earthquake for rehabilitation treatment.
Japan also contributes to multilateral assistance projects.
Russia's participation in the multilateral free trading system is important for the international community. In particular, Russia's accession to the WTO is desirable from the perspective of integrating the Russian economy into the market economic sys tem.