Dmitry Medvedev and Vladimir Putin were invited to dive into Baikal on the Mir.

In the second stage of the Mir expedition on Lake Baikal, about 100 dives of the Mir 1 and Mir 2 deep sea vehicles are planned, the studies will cover the entire lake from June 15 to September 15, 2009. Scientists plan to study the bottom relief, geology, geochemistry, biology and even microorganisms of Baikal, and the number of dives will depend on the weather. Possible expedition participants include Dmitry Medvedev, Vladimir Putin and possibly someone from the Federation Council.

About 100 dives by the deep-sea manned submersibles Mir-1 and Mir-2 are planned as part of the second stage of the Mirs on Baikal expedition. This was reported by Roman Afonin, executive director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Lake Baikal, during the transport of the submersibles to the settlement of Nikola in the Irkutsk District. According to him, the exact number of dives will depend on weather conditions.
The President of the Russian Federation, Dmitry Medvedev, and the Chairman of the Government of the Russian Federation, Vladimir Putin, may descend into Baikal in the deep-sea manned submersible Mir. As Roman Afonin, executive director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Lake Baikal, said, he was invited to take part in the second stage of the Mirs on Baikal expedition by the President of the Republic of Buryatia, Vyacheslav Nagovitsyn.
It is possible that someone from the Federation Council of the Russian Federation will descend into Baikal. The fact is that during the expedition the Baikal Economic Conference will be held in Buryatia, and it will be chaired by the Chairman of the Federation Council of the Russian Federation, Sergey Mironov.
The second stage of the expedition will last from June 15 to September 15, 2009.
The Mirs will dive in 34 areas throughout the Baikal water area. In the southern part of the lake, dives are planned along the slope of the Circum-Baikal Railway, near the epicenter of the earthquake of August 27, 2008, in the area of the Baikalsk Pulp and Paper Mill, the settlements of Bolshiye Koty and Bolshoye Goloustnoye, the Murinskaya gully and the Posolskaya Bank, the gas hydrate field of Peschanka, and the mud volcanoes Bolshoy and Maly.
In Central Baikal, the Mirs will descend to the Saint Petersburg mud volcano, dive in Barguzin Bay near the Svyatoy Nos Peninsula, in the area of the Ushkany Islands, and Cape Gorevoy Utes. A significant number of dives are planned for Northern Baikal. Thus, research will be conducted in Chivyrkuisky Bay, in Frolikha Bay, in the area of the settlement of Davsha, and at Cape Kotelnikovsky, Zavorotny, and Ryty.
The tasks of the second stage of the Mirs on Baikal expedition are geological, geochemical, biological, and other studies. “We will study everything: from the relief of the lakebed to the microorganisms that inhabit Baikal,” explained the executive director of the Foundation for the Preservation of the Lake.