MOSCOW, August 29 (Itar-Tass) —— Russian President Dmitry Medvedev will meet with the leaders of all seven registered political parties in Sochi on Monday. The president is expected to sign at the meeting a decree on the date of the elections to the State Duma. Thus, the parliamentary election campaign will be launched. Meanwhile, the leaders of the parties and the president will discuss the issues of mutual interest.
State Duma Speaker and Chairman of the United Russia Supreme Council Boris Gryzlov intends to touch on introducing compulsory preliminary debates over the candidates from the parties, Deputy Secretary of the United Russia General Council presidium Yuri Shuvalov told reporters. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin has earlier made public the similar initiative. The leader of the United Russia faction in the State Duma also intends to brief the president on the United Russia primaries and to discuss the priorities in the lower house of parliament for a forthcoming session that will be the final one for the fifth State Duma.
High on the agenda for the Liberal Democratic Party of Russia (LDPR) is how the rights of the parties will be observed at upcoming elections. LDPR is concerned over the real equal access of parties to mass media and how to rule out disrupted meetings between candidates to deputies and voters. LDPR leader and State Duma Vice-Speaker Vladimir Zhirinovsky also intends to discuss the development of the North Caucasus.
Meanwhile, the participants in the meeting intend to raise some education issues (a probable abolishment of the unified state exam), the support to domestic producers, economic and political situation on the international scene, the price growth in the housing and utilities sector and the merger of Moscow and some part of the Moscow Region. The Communist Party will also raise an upcoming election campaign. “We launched an election campaign. There is much impudence, still much lying and the lack of normal dialogue,” the leader of the Communist Party Gennady Zyuganov told Itar-Tass. He noted that he will insist on several initiatives from his faction to be debated in the parliament. The Communist variant of the basic law on education and the amendments, which envisage that the top party functionaries should participate in compulsory election debates, are among these initiatives.
The meeting will also focus on a next federal budget. “We have prepared our proposals on the issue. We believe that the proposals of the long-standing budget policy upset the idea of the president for modernization and did not give an opportunity for the real sector of economy to develop,” Zyuganov said. The Communist leader noted that he will dwell on security problems in Russia and a likely second wave of economic crisis, which “the Americans and the Europeans” already experience.
A Just Russia leader Sergei Mironov will raise the problem of offshore schemes of tax evasion and capital drainage to other countries, the A Just Russia press service told reporters. Mironov will also touch on the petrol price growth and the condition of the housing fund. The A Just Russia leader also intends to raise the construction of social housing under the leasing program and the strategy to draft the master plans for the development of big Russian cities.