Vietnamese Prime Minister Nguyen Tan Dung met with Russian leaders in Moscow on Tuesday in a visit to forge closer economic links.

Dung oversaw the signing of several deals, including on the creation of a joint investment fund, an arms contract and a strategic partnership between the countries’ two leading energy firms.

Gazprom and Petrovietnam signed a strategic partnership deal that the two sides said could lead to Gazprom getting a stake in Vietnam’s gas distribution network and to Petrovietnam developing gas fields in Orenburg and Komi.

The partnership could include the “realization of joint projects in Russia and Vietnam, as well as markets in other countries,” Prime Minister Vladimir Putin said after talks with Dung. The two oil firms already work together on a joint venture on the Nagumanovskoye field in Orenburg.

Dung officially invited Russia to participate in the construction of his country’s first nuclear power plant, as Rosatom, the state’s nuclear arm, positions itself as a major player in the world’s nuclear power industry. Russia already has a 15 percent share of the reactor-building market.

“We are ready to help our Vietnamese partners in the realization of a national program of atomic energy development up through 2020,” Putin said after talks with Dung.

The two also agreed to increase ties in the arms sphere, with Vietnam purchasing a submarine and other military hardware from Russia. Dung signed a memorandum providing for aircraft sales and other military cooperation.

In another deal, State-owned VTB and the Bank for Investment and Development of Vietnam agreed to create a joint investment, Interfax reported.

Dung also met with President Dmitry Medvedev, who talked up ties between the two nations, pointing to the 4.1 percent growth in trade between the two countries in the first nine months of 2009.