30/7 Tass 8
(Two takes)
MOSCOW — Russian President Dmitry Medvedev signed a decree to form an interdepartmental commission for counteracting extremism in Russia. The interior minister will chair the commission, the Russian presidential press service reported on Friday. The lineup of the commission should be approved within a month.
MOSCOW — Russian President Dmitry Medvedev sent a congratulatory message to his Peruvian counterpart Ollanta Humala on the inauguration as the president of the country and on Independence Day, which is the national holiday in the Republic of Peru. He invited the Peruvian president to make an official visit in Russia.
MOSCOW — Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has appointed Vladimir Voronkov Russia’s permanent representative at international organizations in Vienna, the Kremlin press service reported on Friday. Before the appointment, Voronkov was director of the European cooperation department of the Russian foreign ministry.
MOSCOW — Russian President Dmitry Medvedev accepted the resignation of Governor of the Tula Region Vyacheslav Dudka, the Russian presidential press service reported on Friday.
MOSCOW — Parties, which gain less than 3% in the State Duma election, will have no right to free broadcast time, Central Elections Commission member Maya Grishina said on Friday.
ASTANA — Kazakhstan’s embassy in Tashkent has sent a note to the Uzbekistani foreign ministry with a request to provide explanations of the arrest of a group of Kazakh mountain climbers, Press Secretary of the Kazakh Foreign Ministry Ilyas Omarov told journalists on Friday.
ASTANA — Kazakhstan believes that Uzbekistan’s actions related to the detention of Kazakh tourists run counter to the friendly nature of bilateral relations, Kazakh foreign ministry said on Friday in a note to the Uzbek foreign office. “This fact runs counter to the friendly relations established under the Treaty of Eternal Friendship between Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan,” the note said.
VILNIUS — Lithuania and Russia follow the way of respect for democratic values and good neighborhood, chosen 20 years earlier, Lithuania’s President Dalia Grybauskaite says in her letter to Russia’s President Dmitry Medvedev, which she sent on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of signing of the Agreement on Basic Principles of Interstate Relations between RSFSR and Lithuania, the country’s presidential press service said on Friday.
MOSCOW — Russia strongly condemns any attempts to change the state system of the Republic of Guinea by force, the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Friday.
TSKHINVAL — Deputies of South Ossetian parliament on Friday frustrated the holding of a parliamentary session that was expected to decide on setting up a new central electoral commission, parliamentary speaker Stanislav Kochiyev told a press conference.
KALININGRAD — The unique vessel Seliger, designed to test new equipment for the Russian Navy and World Ocean research, on Friday will be launched from the Burevestnik stocks of the Yantar Shipyard on the Baltic Sea in Kaliningrad, the company spokesman Sergei Mikhailov told Itar-Tass.
MOSCOW — The process of stopping the oil refinery of LUKOIL Neftechim in Bulgaria’s Burgas has started, but theoretically talks may resume, a representative of the oil company told Itar-Tass on Friday.
KIEV — Former CEO of Ukraine’s national oil and gas company Naftogaz Ukrainy Oleg Dubina said on Friday he was guided by government instructions while signing gas contracts with Russia’s Gazprom in 2009.
SOFIA — Bulgaria’s authorities do not intend to return the license to LUKOIL before it fulfils all legal requirements, Bulgaria’s Prime Minister Boiko Borisov said on Friday as he commented live on the BTV channel problems with closing of the LUKOIL Neftochim Burgas refinery.
MOSCOW — The scale of business verifications in Russia is smaller than that in EU states, Federal Tax Service head Mikhail Mishustin said in Moscow on Friday.
MINSK — Belarussian President Alexander Lukashenko on Friday set the task for the republic to establish the production of rail cars of domestically manufactured components within two years.
MOSCOW — Russian President Dmitry Medvedev signed a decree to appoint several senior police officers, the Russian presidential press service reported on Friday.
GORKI— Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has urged to call to account all those responsible for the wreck of the Bulgaria pleasure boat that claimed more than a hundred human lives.
GORKI — Russian President Dmitry Medvedev estimated positively the results of the committee for extraordinary refresher courses for the top brass of the Interior Ministry and decided to reshape it in a standing committee.
MOSCOW — Direct passenger rail service is resuming on Friday between Moscow and Sukhum. Two through-passenger cars will run within the train No. 75/76 Moscow-Adler covering the distance of 2,072 kilometres in about 44 hours.
WARSAW — The skills level of the crew threatened security of the flight of the presidential Tu-154 on April 10, 20101, members of Poland’s governmental commission which investigated into the crash.
MOSCOW— The Polish theory of the presidential plane crash near Smolensk in April 2010 has a lot in common with the report of the Interstate Aviation Committee, but some conclusions are not quite clear, head of the Committee’s Technical Commission Alexei Morozov said on Friday.
MOSCOW — The Moscow police warns that it will deter all unauthorized actions in the Triumphalnaya Square on July 31, as it told Itar-Tass on Friday.
MOSCOW — The Russian Investigation Committee will take into account the conclusion Poland has drawn from the crash of the presidential Tupolev Tu-154 jet, Committee spokesman Vladimir Markin said.
MOSCOW — Direct railroad traffic has resumed between Moscow and Sukhumi. A Moscow-Alder train with eight cars routed for Abkhazia departed from the Moscow Paveletsky Railroad Terminal at 5:20 p.m. The passengers will cover the distance of 2,072 kilometers within 44 hours and reach Sukhumi on Sunday afternoon.
MOSCOW — The Federal Air Transport Service has proposed to ban regular flights of airlines, which have less than 20 jets of the same type, service spokesman Sergei Izvolsky said on Friday.
KRASNODAR— About 200 passengers of the Continent airline are stranded at the Anapa Airport as the airline has announced its bankruptcy and cancelled all flights, a source at the Krasnodar territorial administration told Itar-Tass.
MOSCOW— The Russian Defense Ministry and the defense sector will sign this year’s contracts and report the signing by the deadlines set by the president and the prime minister, Defense Minister Anatoly Serdyukov said on Friday.
VLADIVOSTOK — Two warships of the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) of China – the guided-missile frigate Luoyang and the ocean-going training warship Zhenghe have arrived in Vladivostok on Friday on an unofficial visit.
ARKHANGELSK — More than 1,100 people, including 154 paratroopers, and 250 machines are putting out forest fires in the Arkhangelsk region, the regional emergency situations department said on Friday.