Officially

President

Signed federal laws on the ratification of the Treaty on Friendly Relations and Cooperation between Russia and Romania and the Treaty on the Fundamentals of Relations between Russia and Nicaragua. The agreement between Russia and Romania was signed in Moscow on July 4 last year, adopted by the State Duma on January 23, 2004 and approved by the Federation Council on February 11. The agreement between Russia and Nicaragua was signed in New York on September 18, 2002, adopted by the State Duma on January 23, 2004, and approved by the Federation Council on February 11.

The presidential administration is preparing a draft decree on the formation of a register of strategic enterprises in Russia , said First Deputy Minister of Property Relations Alexander Braverman. The presidential decree should define the main criteria for classifying enterprises as strategic and strengthen state control over the procedures of their privatization and bankruptcy. The initiators of this proposal are the Ministry of Economic Development, the Ministry of Property and the Security Council.

Departments

In Russia, the income tax rate for individuals will not increase from 13 to 17%. This was reported by the acting Minister of Economic Development and Trade German Gref. “There are no such plans to increase the rate,” he said. — There is one proposal that is currently being considered: the introduction of an insurance pension payment into the funded pension system. At the same time, a compensation mechanism is proposed. 2% from income tax: its effective rate would be 11%, not 12% plus a two percent wage increase.”

The number of refugees and internally displaced persons in Russia at the beginning of January 2004 amounted to 361 thousand people compared to 506 thousand people at the beginning of 2003. This information was disseminated by the State Statistics Committee with reference to data from the Federal Migration Service of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Russia. According to statistics, about 42% (151 thousand people) of the total number of refugees and internally displaced persons are former residents of Kazakhstan, 13% (49 thousand) of Uzbekistan, 9% (32 thousand each) of Tajikistan and Georgia. Over 61 thousand refugees and internally displaced persons (17%) moved within Russia from regions with an unstable socio-political situation.

According to Goskomstat, the total number of unemployed in Russia, calculated according to the methodology of the International Labor Organization, in January 2004 increased by 0.7% compared to December 2003 - to 5.806 million people, which amounted to 8% of the country's economically active population at February 1st.

The total wage arrears in Russia increased by 2.765 billion rubles in January. and as of February 1 equaled 27.195 billion rubles. Budgetary wage arrears in January increased by 470 million rubles, to a value of 2.73 billion rubles.

Real incomes of the Russian population in January increased by 16.5% compared to last year's January, but were 32.8% lower than in December 2003. The average per capita income of Russians in January amounted to 4,975 rubles.

Russia in 2004 can collect from 75 to 80 million tons of grain in weight after processing, the acting head said yesterday. Deputy Prime Minister, acting Minister of Agriculture Alexey Gordeev at a meeting of the International Agribusiness Club. In 2003, grain production in Russia amounted to 67.2 million tons compared to 86.5 million tons in 2002. As Alexey Gordeev noted, the task of increasing grain production can be achieved if agricultural producers expand the area under grain and leguminous crops by 3 million hectares compared to the harvested area last year.

Accounts Chamber

Proposes to provide in legislation for the creation in Russia of a unified state register of organizations subject to financial rehabilitation. This was announced by the Chairman of the Accounts Chamber Sergei Stepashin, speaking at the conference “The first year of the law “On Insolvency (Bankruptcy)”. Results and prospects." According to Sergei Stepashin, at the moment there is an objective need to create a single information resource for insolvent organizations, which will not only improve transparency in the field of financial recovery of enterprises, but will also help organizations avoid fraud on the part of those wishing to enrich themselves during bankruptcy proceedings.

State Duma

State Duma Chairman Boris Gryzlov arrived in Kyiv yesterday on a two-day working visit. This is Boris Gryzlov's first foreign visit as Speaker of the State Duma. Boris Gryzlov said that he is going to propose to the Chairman of the Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine Vladimir Lytvyn to create an inter-parliamentary group that will “deal with the development of the Common Economic Space, unify legislation, create new laws that meet the most modern market standards.”

Army

The Ministry of Defense considers it important to support the vertically integrated structures created in the defense-industrial complex with state defense orders. “The Sozvezdie and Vega holdings created at the Russian Agency for Control Systems (RASU), as well as the Almaz-Antey air defense concern, are structures that not only determine development in a specific scientific and technical direction, but actually determine the development industry. The Ministry of Defense, as the main government customer, has supported and will in every possible way support the policy of creating such structures, including defense orders,” said Deputy Minister of Defense, Chief of Armaments of the Armed Forces, Colonel General Alexey Moskovsky at a meeting of the RASU board.

Regions

Early voting for the presidential elections scheduled for March 14 for certain groups of voters in the Leningrad region will begin on March 2. As reported by the regional election commission, communication with the islands of the Gulf of Finland of Sommers, Moshchny, Gogland, Kozliny and Seskar, where military voters are located, is carried out only by helicopter in winter. Since it may not be possible to hold a vote on each of the islands on one day, March 14, the commission decided to organize voting for military personnel and members of their families from March 2 to 9.

There will be no forced relocation from tent camps located on the territory of Ingushetia. This was stated by Presidential Plenipotentiary Representative in the Southern Federal District Viktor Kazantsev, having familiarized himself with the problem of internally displaced persons. According to the plenipotentiary, “two tent camps in Ingushetia for forced Chechen migrants will operate for several more months.” It is necessary, he noted, “some time to settle the returning citizens of the Chechen Republic and provide them with employment.” According to the State Council of Chechnya, 4,620 Chechen migrants remain in tent camps in Ingushetia; last year, 39 thousand refugees returned from Ingushetia to Chechnya.

Based on materials from news agencies and our own information