RAPOTA APPOINTED DEPUTY MINISTER OF INDUSTRY AND SCIENCE
Nezavisimaya Gazeta, June 14, 2000, p. 1
Grigory Rapota, Mikhail Kirpichnikov, Andrei Svinarenko, and Boris Aleshin have been appointed senior deputy ministers of industry, science, and technology. According to the Ministry of Industry, Science, and Technology, the corresponding governmental decree was signed on Saturday. In 1994-98, Grigory Rapota was deputy director of the Foreign Intelligence Service. In 1998, he was appointed deputy secretary of the Security Council. In November 1998, he was appointed director of the Rosvooruzhenie state arms export company.
GOVERNMENT PAYS PART OF ITS DEBTS TO MILITARY-INDUSTRIL COMPLEX
Nezavisimaya Gazeta, June 14, 2000, p. 4
In 2000, the government has paid 6.6 billion rubles toward clearing its debts to defense sector enterprises. According to Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin, at the start of 2000 debt to military-industrial complex enterprises totaled 14.6 billion rubles. The deputy prime minister noted that the government has now exhausted all resources in the 2000 budget for paying this debt. Kudrin has said that in the second quarter the government will decide how much it can pay to military-industrial complex enterprises from additional budget revenues. According to him, the debt will be cleared or rescheduled as 1-2 year bills by the end of the year.
REFINANCING RATE WILL NOT BE REDUCED SOON
Nezavisimaya Gazeta, June 14, 2000, p. 4
Tatiana Paramonova, Senior Vice-President of the Central Bank, has announced that the bank will not make any hasty decisions about reducing the refinancing rate. She has noted that currently there is an inclination to reduce the rate. According to Tatiana Paramonova, the refinancing rate is not the only factor that hampers investment in the real sector of the economy.
GREF’S PROGRAM TIPPED TO BECOME GOVERNMENT PROGRAM
Trud, June 14, 2000, p. 1
According to reports from the Russian White House, by the end of this week Gref’s economic program will become the government program. The contents of this program are not quite clear, but it can be said with certainty what will not be in it. For instance, there will be no minor details like in previous five-year plans. The complicated business registration system proposed earlier has also been rejected: the more complicated this system is, the more officials will take bribes. The number of monitoring agencies will also dwindle. The idea of criminal prosecution for petty economic crimes has been rejected.
The program is 500 pages long and contains plans for the next decade.
NEW HEAD OF ADMINISTRATION APPOINTED IN CHECHNYA
Izvestia, June 14, 2000, p. 3
Chechen Mufti Ahmed Kadyrov has been appointed as the new head of the administration in Chechnya. The choice was chiefly determined by the ethnicity of the new leader: it was decided in the Kremlin that it is easier for a Chechen to govern Chechens. Kadyrov is respected by Chechens. He has a very difficult task: to become known as the leader of the Chechens, despite the fact that the federal center will be behind his back.
General Gennady Troshev has announced that he will cooperate with the mufti. From now on, the Russian federal forces will coordinate their activities with the new authorities of the republic. It is not ruled out that a representative of the Russian military will be appointed deputy chairman of the Chechen Administration.
