The State Duma adopted on Wednesday in the final third reading the presidential bill "On the Public Chamber of the Russian Federation", RBC reports. 346 MPs voted in favor, 50 voted against, and there were no abstentions.

Herman Gref. Photo of the site www.spbumag.nw.ru Yuganskneftegaz will remain an independent state company. According to Prime-Tass, this was announced on Wednesday by the head of the Ministry of Economic Development German Gref. He confirmed that Yuganskneftegaz would not participate in the merger of Gazprom and Rosneft.

On Wednesday, Israeli troops began the process of transferring the city of Jericho in the West Bank to the control of the national Palestinian Authority, Reuters reported. The transmission is due to begin at 13:00 on Wednesday and be completed in four weeks. A fundamental decision on this was reached at the Palestinian-Israeli summit in Sharm el-Sheikh in February.

The Tigilsky District Court of the Koryak Autonomous Okrug sentenced the vice-governor of the district, Mikhail Sokolovsky, to 1.5 years in prison to be served in a penal colony. By a court decision, he is also deprived of the right to hold leadership positions for a period of three years, RIA Novosti reports. Sokolovsky was charged with a crime under Part 3 of Article 286 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“abuse of official powers that caused serious harm”).

Evgeny Kiselev. Photo from the site www.lenta.ru The Moscow News team on Friday intends to release a special newspaper number, which will be entitled "Moscow News without Evgeny Kiselev." Various youth organizations will help in the distribution of this issue. According to Echo of Moscow, this was announced by the former deputy head of the publication Mikhail Shevelev.

Moscow Mayor Yury Luzhkov, speaking on the stage of Moscow's Novaya Opera Theater on Tuesday at the opening of Days of Zagreb in Moscow, said that "the next mayor of Moscow will be a woman." "I am happy to receive here the Croatian delegation and the mayor of Zagreb, Vlasta Pavić, a wonderful mayor, a woman mayor. I am sure that the next mayor of Moscow, or at least one, no later, will be a woman," RIA Novosti quotes Luzhkov.

In Izhevsk (Udmurtia), about two thousand people took part on Wednesday in a protest rally against the law on preferential payments. The rally began at the residence of the head of the republic, later they moved to the building of the State Council, Gazeta.Ru reports with reference to Interfax.

Special operation in Grozny. Photo from the site politics.netcity.ru In Grozny, a large -scale special operation to capture the leaders of the separatists and the prevention of terrorist attacks is carried out. This was reported to RIA Novosti in the regional operational headquarters for managing a counter -terrorism operation in the North Caucasus (Rosh).

Russian President Vladimir Putin invited representatives of the country's business associations to an audience in the Kremlin on March 24. This is reported by Vedomosti, citing a source in the presidential administration.

On Tuesday, Alexander Temerko, deputy chairman of the board of directors of the oil company Yukos-Moskva LLC, who was in charge of interaction with government agencies, resigned from Yukos. As Temerko explained to Kommersant, his dismissal is connected with the reorganization of the company, the details of which will be made public in the near future.

The Kamchatka deputies appealed to the Prosecutor General's Office with a request to check the legality of the exploration and development of hydrocarbons by the Rosneft company on the West Kamchatka shelf of the Sea of ​​Okhotsk. This was reported to RIA Novosti by the press secretary of the regional Duma, Anna Sokolova.

On Wednesday, the State Duma adopted in the second and third, final readings amendments to the law "On Defense", significantly expanding the purpose of the Armed Forces. In particular, the document spells out a legal mechanism that allows the military to be involved in countering terrorist activities. According to the authors of the law, the document eliminates a legal gap and solves problems related to the legitimacy of involving the Armed Forces to participate in a counter-terrorist operation.

In Lipetsk, a 19-year-old previously convicted local resident was detained, who is suspected of attacking an African student. As a source in the Russian Interior Ministry told Interfax, on Tuesday the prosecutor's office opened a criminal case under Article 282 of the Criminal Code ("inciting national, racial or religious hatred") against a young man who attacked an African student, Gazeta.ru reports.

The issue of introducing a single currency within the framework of the Union State of Russia and Belarus has not been removed since January 1, 2006. According to RIA Novosti, this was stated by Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov after a meeting of the Council of Ministers of the Union State. "Moreover, the positions of the parties have become clearer," Fradkov said. According to the Russian prime minister, the issue has become clearer and its discussion will be continued at a higher level.

Italy will start withdrawing its troops from Iraq in September 2005. This was stated by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi in an interview with the Rai TV channel, adding that the withdrawal of troops will be carried out "in the framework of an agreement with the allies." It is reported by the Air Force. Berlusconi said the decision to withdraw troops was taken after a conversation with British Prime Minister Tony Blair.