MOSCOW. March 26 (Interfax) – Differentiation between the levels of unemployment in Russia’s federal districts remains strong – the gap in the districts can surpass four-fold and in the regions 40-fold, the Federal State Statistics Service Rosstat said in a report on employment and unemployment in February. The lowest level of unemployment, in accordance with ILO criteria, was in the […]
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DURBAN, March 27 (RIA Novosti) President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday played up Russia’s potential as an investment destination as he tried to reassure investors at a summit of the world’s leading emerging market economies that the country was open for new business projects. “Let me emphasize that Russia and its economy are open for new trade and investment projects. […]
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MOSCOW. March 26 (Interfax) – Russia’s stock market has very strong potential for growth, Morgan Stanley analysts believe. Russian equities are currently the lowest priced among emerging markets and there are a number of reasons to expect that the discount at which they are traded will decrease, the investment bank’s analysts said in a report. Even the Russian oil and […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Ilya Arkhipov & Vladimir Kuznetsov – March 27, 2013) Russia is among the biggest losers of the crisis in Cyprus and may use its development bank to aid companies with funds trapped behind capital controls in place on the cash-strapped island, the head of the state lender said. “We are prepared to consider proposals and ideas, […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Manik Mehta – March 27, 2013) BERLIN In an attempt to refurbish its image as a tourist destination, Russia went on a charm offensive to court international travelers at the recent Berlin International Tourism Bourse, the world’s largest tourism show. Conceding that visa rules were a big problem, a large contingent of Russian tour […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Howard Amos – March 27, 2013) While most Russians wade through a bureaucratic quagmire to get a visa for the European Union or the United States, once they arrive they enjoy almost complete freedom of movement. For those who choose to come to Russia to live and work, however, the bureaucratic challenges really begin to […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Howard Amos – March 26, 2013) A deal between Cyprus and European lenders was backed by the Kremlin on Monday even as top Russian officials unleashed a storm of angry rhetoric about a compulsory levy on local bank accounts included in the rescue package. President Vladimir Putin “decided to support” the agreement between Cyprus and […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – March 25, 2013 – Conor Lenihan, special to RBTH) Russia has been climbing rapidly up the innovation rankings over the last five years. Conor Lenihan is Skolkovo Foundation Vice President for External Economic Relations. He previously served as Ireland’s Minister for Science, Technology and Innovation. German statesman Otto von Bismarck once famously observed […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Jonathan Earle – March 26, 2013) “Is Boris Berezovsky the godfather of Russia’s godfathers? It sure looks that way,” Russian-American journalist Paul Klebnikov wrote in an article published in late 1996, the year a small group of Russian oligarchs, including Berezovsky, engineered President Boris Yeltsin’s re-election. Berezovsky, then a billionaire businessman, objected to the portrayal, […]
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(Interfax – MOSCOW, March 26, 2013) – Proposals for global economic recovery dominate the agenda for a planned summit of BRICS on Tuesday and Wednesday. President Vladimir Putin will represent Russia at what is the fifth summit of Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa. The meeting will be held in Durban, South Africa. “The pace of growth of the […]
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(Russia Beyond the Headlines – rbth.ru – Yuri Paniyev, special to RBTH – March 26, 2013) Russian Foreign Ministry has released an official strategy for Russia’s participation in the BRICS association. The document stresses the need to turn the bloc into a comprehensive institution for daily cooperation on key global issues The Kremlin and Russian Foreign Ministry have released an […]
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MOSCOW. March 26 (Interfax) – Recent polls indicate that in the opinion of Russian citizens, lawmakers are the wealthiest of civil servants, and they proposed setting an income limit for those seeking civil service. Fifty-five percent of respondents said deputies of the State Duma and the Federation Council are the richest among civil servants, and 52% said government executives are, […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – March 26, 2013) Most Russians find it distasteful when lawmakers and officials are wealthy, a survey published Tuesday said. According to a poll conducted by the Levada Center, 77 percent of Russians believe it’s either “indecent” or “criminal” for government representatives to be flush with money, Kommersant reported. An even greater proportion, 82 percent of […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – March 25, 2013) The survey conducted by the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RSPP) together with Fleishman-Hillard Vanguard shows that 44% of respondents noticed the improvement of the business environment (34% considers the improvement minor) versus 55% in 2011, RBC daily reported. The improvement in the quality of tax administration is accompanied by […]
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NICOSIA, March 25 (RIA Novosti) The Cypriot authorities’ plans to force losses on local account holders to unlock a much-needed bailout from international lenders breach international accords and will be challenged in court, the head of the Association of Russian Businessmen in Cyprus said on Monday. The finance ministers of the 17-nation euro area agreed early on Monday on […]
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(Interfax – March 25, 2013) The number of people with incomes below the survival minimum in Russia in 2012 went down to 15.8 million people from 18 million in 2011, Russia’s Statistics Agency Rosstat has reported. The poverty rate (the percentage of people with incomes below the survival minimum) in Russia in 2012 decreased to 11.2 percent from 12.7 percent […]
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(opendemocracy.net – Mikhail Loginov – March 21, 2013) Mikhail Loginov is a journalist and novelist based in St Petersburg. He is the author of the recently published bestselling political thriller “Battle for Kremlin”. Throughout Russia’s history its rulers have attempted to curtail the consumption of alcohol and/or tobacco. Gorbachev had little success in the 1980s; will this year’s new laws […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – March 25, 2013) The news images on Friday were dripping with symbolism. A Cypriot delegation lead by Finance minister Michael Sarris was on its way out to the airport having failed to secure a 10bn rescue package from the Kremlin, while newly anointed Chinese premier Xi Jinping was on his way in from the […]
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(RFE/RL – www.rferl.org – Robert Coalson – March 24, 2013) Boris Berezovsky who was found dead of as yet undetermined causes in his London home on March 23 was a key figure among those who brought Vladimir Putin to power in 1999. And although Berezovsky was driven into exile by the end of 2000, over the years he […]
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[Russian Prosecutor General’s Office to continue its legal actions to bring Berezovsky’s criminally acquired assets back to Russia – ITAR-TASS – March 25, 2013 – http://www.itar-tass.com/en/c32/686220.html] ITAR-TASS reports on Russian efforts to seize assets of exiled Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky, recently found dead under undetermined circumstances in Britain, where he had been granted political asylum. The Russian Prosecutor General’s Office […]
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[Exiled oligarch Boris Berezovsky died in Britain – ITAR-TASS – March 25, 2013 – http://www.itar-tass.com/en/c142/686021.html] ITAR-TASS covers the death of exiled Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky in Britain: Boris Berezovsky, an exiled oligarch and one of the main figures on the Russian political scene of Boris Yeltsin’s epoch, was found dead at his mansion in the town Ascot in the English […]
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(Interfax – March 25, 2013) Russian tycoon Boris Berezovsky, who has died in London, wanted to be buried near a Moscow region church where he was baptized, Former Secretary of Russia’s Security Council, Ivan Rybkin, said. “He told me – there is a cemetery in the Moscow region’s Tarasovka near an ancient brick church, where he was baptized after the […]
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[No radiation at Berezovsky home, no sign of outside role in death – Reuters – Olivia Harris – March 25, 2013 – click here for full article] Reuters covers the death in Britain of exiled Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky. The post-mortem still awaits completion, and Berezovsky had been the target of multiple assassination attempts. But there has been no announcement […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Alexander Bratersky and Natalya Krainova – March 25, 2013) Boris Berezovsky would probably heap all of his ill fortunes at the feet of Vladimir Putin, the man whom he helped make Russia’s president but then spent the rest of his life trying to topple. Still, the relationship between Putin and Berezovsky, who was found dead […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – March 22, 2013) Andrew Somers will step aside after 12 years as president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Russia. Somers has informed the business association’s board that this will be his last year at its helm, AmCham said Friday. “He will move to the private sector and will begin an association in this […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Anatoly Medetsky – March 22, 2013) The Cabinet on Thursday backed a plan to invigorate the economy of the Far East, and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said the government would later this month formally ask the parliament to slash taxes for new business projects in the region. Plans to develop the remote and sparsely populated […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Artyom Danielyan & Olga Tanas – March 22, 1013) Russia’s central bank may change its monetary policy even as its new leadership focuses on continuity, said Elvira Nabiullina, President Vladimir Putin’s nominee to take over as Bank Rossii chairman in June. “Policy continuity should be maintained, because the credibility factor is very important in the banking […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Irina Filatova and Howard Amos – March 22, 2013) Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev on Thursday intensified his criticism of a plan by European financial authorities to rescue the Cypriot economy, labeling it as “completely absurd,” in the most colorful response yet by Russian officials to the controversial measures. The proposal to impose a one-time levy […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – Ben Aris in Moscow – March 22, 2013) Russia’s economy is not just slowing; it is stagnating. In the first few months of this year, GDP growth slowed to a crawl and the Kremlin is starting to panic, setting off a lively public debate over how to kick start growth that so far has […]
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(Moscow News – themoscownews.com – Nathan Gray – March 21, 2013) PARIS – Before an audience of mostly French businesspeople in Paris on Tuesday, political and business representatives outlined the benefits and risks of conducting business in Russia at The Economist magazine’s Russia Business Summit. Targeted at Western European investors, the event at times took on the air of a […]
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GORKI (Moscow Region), March 20 (RIA Novosti) Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev on Wednesday slammed the European Union and Cyprus for what he described as their dismal management of the island nation’s debt woes. Medvedev told journalists from European media outlets in an interview that the mishandling of the crisis had undermined confidence in financial institutions, in Cyprus and […]
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(RFE/RL – rferl.org – March 20, 2013) As the financial crisis deepens in Cyprus, attention is focusing on Russia’s role in preventing the Mediterranean island nation from going bankrupt and exiting the eurozone. RFE/RL’s Claire Bigg spoke to Natalya Orlova, chief economist at Alfa Bank. RFE/RL: Michael Sarris, the Cypriot finance minister, was in Moscow this week to discuss the […]
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(Bloomberg – bloomberg.com – Henry Meyer & Ilya Arkhipov – March 21, 2013) Russia rebuffed Cyprus’s request for a bailout loan as the euro-area nation sought to salvage talks in Moscow by wooing investment in its energy reserves. Russia is unable to provide loans and will instead consider making investments in the Cypriot energy industry, the island nation’s Finance Minister […]
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(Window on Eurasia – Paul Goble – Staunton, March 21, 2013 – http://windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2013/03/window-on-eurasia-contraction-of.html) The death of Russian villages is already an old if very sad story, but that country’s economic decline is now leading to the contraction of the population of many small and mid-sized cities, a development that has received little attention but that entails enormous social, economic and […]
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(Interfax – March 21, 2013) Russian human rights ombudsman Vladimir Lukin said he will continue insisting that the court reverse the conviction of members of the feminist punk group Pussy Riot. “No doubt, the case will go higher and will reach the Supreme Court. We have worded our position and it is unchanged,” Lukin told Interfax on Thursday. It was reported […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Howard Amos and Irina Filatova – March 21, 2013) A desperate effort by Cypriot authorities to win financial aid from the Kremlin failed to yield any results Wednesday, as a deal eluded Cyprus’ finance minister, Michalis Sarris, during a visit to Moscow. Russian companies are being hit by a freeze on Cypriot bank accounts as […]
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MOSCOW. March 21 (Interfax) – The BRICS group (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) will not form a military alliance and will center its efforts on tackling economic and social issues, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov said. “I would like to reiterate once again that BRICS is not a bloc directed against third states. This principle was firmly […]
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(Institute of Modern Russia – imrussia.org – Donald Jensen – March 19, 2013) Despite rumors of his waning influence, Rosneft chief Igor Sechin remains one of the most powerful members of Russia’s ruling establishment. Donald N. Jensen, Resident Fellow at the Center for Transatlantic Relations at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies, discusses Sechin’s latest “string of triumphs.” […]
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MOSCOW, March 20 (RIA Novosti) President Vladimir Putin has submitted to the State Duma the candidacy of his economic advisor, Elvira Nabiullina, for the head of Russia’s Central Bank, the Kremlin said on Wednesday. Putin first proposed Nabiullina’s candidacy on March 12 at a meeting with incumbent Central Bank chief Sergei Ignatyev, who has served three successive terms and […]
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MOSCOW, March 20 (RIA Novosti) Cypriot Finance Minister Michael Sarris is set to continue negotiations on a potential Russian loan with Russia’s First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov on Wednesday, after initial talks between the two countries’ finance ministries ended without an agreement. The Cypriot minister is in Moscow to discuss the extension of a 2.5-billion-euro loan that Russia […]
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MOSCOW. March 20 (Interfax) – Capital outflow from Russia was approximately $6 billion in February, Deputy Economic Development Minister Andrei Klepach told reporters. “Our estimate so far is about $6 billion,” Klepach said. In other words, outflow slowed in February but outflow for the first two months of the year was still above the official forecast for the whole year. […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – March 20, 2013) Net capital outflow from the Russian economy has already exceeded the official forecast for the whole of 2013, despite slowing down moderately in February, Deputy Economic Development Minister Andrei Klepach said Wednesday. According to the ministry’s estimate, capital outflow in February was about $6 billion, whereas in January the Russian economy leaked […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Yekaterina Kravtsova and Ezekiel Pfeifer – March 20, 2013) Investigators said Tuesday that they had closed the case into the 2009 death of lawyer Sergei Magnitsky, whose name is attached to a U.S. law that has caused tension in U.S.-Russian relations by seeking to punish Russians implicated in human rights violations. An inquiry into Magnitsky’s […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Anatoly Medetsky – March 20, 2013) The sudden prospect that billions of dollars of Russian money might never return to its owners, due to part of the Cyprus bailout plan, evoked a slate of proposals here Tuesday to prevent the damage. VTB, the country’s second-largest lender, which has a subsidiary in Cyprus, laid out a […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Rajeev Sharma – March 20, 2013) NEW DELHI At least four deals will be reached at a BRICS summit that President Vladimir Putin will attend in South Africa next week, including the establishment of a business council and a consortium of think tanks from BRICS countries, a senior Indian official said. Also high on […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Howard Amos – March 19, 2013) Morgan Stanley joined the ranks of those predicting a sluggish period for the Russian economy Monday as it cut its 2013 growth forecast to below 3 percent. The New York-based investment bank lowered its expectations for this year’s growth to 2.9 percent, down from the 3.1 percent it predicted […]
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(Business New Europe – bne.eu – March 19, 2013) Only 1.45% of Russians or 13% of the economically active population, are ready to invest in the stock market, a situation that has remained unchanged in the past five years, Public Opinion Foundation (FOM) Director Lyudmila Presnyakova said, citing research done for the Moscow Exchange. “The financial literacy of the population […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – March 19, 2013) Foreign companies operating in Russia said the country’s business climate had improved in 2012, according to a study released by the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs and Fleishman-Hillard Vanguard, a subsidiary of U.S. public relations agency Fleishman-Hillard. Compared with 2011, 44 percent of the respondents noted an improvement, with 34 percent […]
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(Moscow News – themoscownews.com – Aleksandras Budrys – March 19, 2013) Russia’s Culture Ministry has presented to the government a bill on 10-day visa-free entry for “non-dangerous” foreigners to participate in cultural, sporting and business events, Minister Vladimir Medinsky said on Tuesday. “We have developed a number of draft laws in this regard,” Medinsky told Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev at […]
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(Moscow Times – themoscowtimes.com – Irina Filatova – March 19, 2013) The proposal by the Cypriot authorities to introduce a levy on the country’s bank deposits as part of a plan to bail out its economy drew harsh criticism from Moscow on Monday, with the largest Russian lenders facing multibillion-dollar losses as a result of the measure. President Vladimir Putin […]
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