India and Russia on Monday moved to strengthen their economic ties by inking a pact on a Kremlin-backed $2 billion investment fund and agreeing to open talks on a Comprehensive Economic Partnership Agreement that will also involve Belarus and Kazakhstan. After talks between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Vladimir Putin at the twelfth straight annual summit, the two countries finalised 10 agreements. Among them were two military contracts, worth about Rs. 20,000 crore that had been in the works for some time.