MOSCOW, April 8 (Xinhua) -- Russia is ready to enter the World Trade Organization (WTO) this year, President-elect Dmitry Medvedev said here Tuesday.

    "We are really ready to join the WTO, we are quite capable of completing this process within this year," Medvedev was quoted by the Itar-Tass news agency as saying, while speaking to members of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RUIE).

    "At the same time, we should acquire WTO membership on regular terms, not like a poor relation."

    "A lot has been done, and nearly all the solutions have been found. The latest meeting with the American colleagues showed that they are ready to help and do away with atavistic laws. At least, they say so," Medvedev said.

    "We shall see what happens. We must enter the organization with our head high rather than bowed," he added.

    The issue of Russia's admission to the WTO was also discussed at a meeting between outgoing Russian President Vladimir Putin and his U.S. counterpart George W. Bush in Sochi on Sunday. The two sides adopted a so-called Sochi Declaration in which the parties fixed the desire to accomplish the objective this year.