According to the Kommersant publication, the management of the Izhevsk Automobile Plant announced on Tuesday that the production of Izh "Oda" and "Fabula" models is planned to stop as of July 1 of this year. The vacated areas will be transferred to expand the production of cars of the Korean brand Kia. However, it is worth noting the fact that so far representatives of Izh-Avto have not commented on this information.

On Tuesday, UN officials announced that they had received information according to which American authorities are illegally holding terrorist suspects on Navy ships, BBC News reports. According to the UN special rapporteur on the rights of prisoners, Manfred Nowak, at the moment he does not have absolutely reliable information regarding the “floating prisons”, but he called on the US authorities to actively cooperate in an investigation into this issue.

The US House of Representatives approved a bill to allocate funds for foreign aid. As reported by Reuters, its volume will be $20.3 billion, which is $2.5 billion less than President George W. Bush requested. The main cuts affected the Millennium Challenge Account program, which provided financial assistance to the poorest countries of the Third World carrying out urgent political and economic reforms.

From January 1, 2006, the Czech Republic will join the ranks of countries where there is a ban on smoking in public places. In addition, according to a law adopted on Wednesday by the lower house of the Czech parliament, the sale of cigarettes will be limited in the country, reports Reuters. By public places, Czech parliamentarians mean public areas in buildings, offices, as well as bus stops and railway platforms.

The collection of gifts from Russian President Vladimir Putin has been replenished with a diamond-encrusted ring for victory in the 2005 American Super Bowl, reports the Boston Globe. During Putin's meeting with American business representatives at the Konstantinovsky Palace near St. Petersburg, Robert Kraft, owner of the New England Patriots, the American football team that won this year's Super Bowl, showed Putin his championship ring.

The Russian Prosecutor General's Office confirmed the beating of several prisoners of colony No. 3 in the city of Lgov, Kursk region, who on Tuesday cut themselves in protest against “lawlessness on the part of the management of the correctional institution, ” Interfax reports .

Deliveries of Russian missile systems to Syria will not lead to destabilization of the situation in the Middle East, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said in an interview with the Arabic magazine Al-Watan Al-Arabi, which was posted on the Foreign Ministry website on Wednesday. “Syria, like other states, has the legal right to self-defense. By carrying out relevant supplies, we are not doing anything that could have destabilizing consequences for the Middle East region,” the diplomat noted.

The head of RAO UES of Russia, Anatoly Chubais, acknowledged the criticism of the Russian leadership against RAO UES related to non-core assets as fair, RIA Novosti reports . Chubais told reporters about this before the start of the company's annual meeting of shareholders. “We responded very quickly, and the board of directors of RAO UES developed a new strict procedure for the sale of non-core assets.

An extraordinary session of the People's Assembly of the Karachay-Cherkess Republic was interrupted on Wednesday after about 150 residents of the village of Kubina burst into the meeting room of the Government House in Cherkessk, the Interfax agency reports . Previously, a crowd of about 200 people broke through the police cordons. Several clashes occurred, but no one was injured and no one required medical attention.

Chairman of the Moscow 2012 Bid Committee, Vice-Mayor Valery Shantsev believes that the Russian capital has a real chance to prove to the IOC members that Moscow deserves the right to host the Olympics more than others and can do it better than anyone else. In an interview given to Rossiyskaya Gazeta , he noted that, if necessary, Moscow is ready to host the Olympic Games in six months.

Deputies of the People's Assembly of Karachevo-Cherkessia left the hall, but some of the protesters are still in the hall and do not intend to leave it, RIA Novosti reports . After a three-hour break, the extraordinary session of the people's assembly ended. It was decided to postpone consideration of the issue of the lands of the village of Kubin until the arrival of a commission from the federal center.

US Ambassador to the UN Anne Patterson, during a meeting in New York with Japanese Deputy Foreign Minister Ichiro Aisawa, made it clear that the US does not take a rigid position on the number of new permanent members of the UN Security Council and is ready to discuss this issue. The Kyodo News agency reported this with reference to an unnamed diplomatic source in Japan.

Belarus is considering the issue of withdrawing from the Bishkek agreement on visa-free travel for citizens within the CIS. this . As Novye Izvestia wrote on Tuesday , Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic Alexander Gerasimenko stated Currently, the republic has bilateral agreements on visa-free travel for citizens with all Commonwealth countries, except Georgia and Azerbaijan.

The jury of the 2005 Booker Open Russia literary prize announced a “long list” of works accepted for participation in the competition at a press conference in Moscow on Tuesday, Interfax reports . 22 works published in 2004-2005 are competing for the prize for the best novel in Russian.

The head of the Federal Agency for Press and Mass Communications, Mikhail Seslavinsky, expressed dissatisfaction with the children's program “Good night, kids!”, the Novye Izvestia newspaper wrote on Wednesday .