Athletes who have undergone sex change will be allowed to perform at the Olympic Games. Such a decision, which, of course, will cause an extremely ambiguous reaction, was adopted at a meeting of medical experts, which was organized in Sweden by the International Olympic Committee. The approval of an unprecedented measure is expected, according to informed sources, in the coming weeks.

Former head of the Tax Code of Yukos Mikhail Khodorkovsky was re -elected to the board of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs (RSPP). "The election of Khodorkovsky is not solidarity. There is a presumption of innocence. The court has not yet taken place and has not proved the guilt of Mikhail Khodorkovsky. We should not draw up an opinion about a person before a court decision," the President of the Union Arkady Volsky said at a press conference at the end of the RSPP Congress.

A gas explosion occurred in the coal mine in the east of China, which cost 48 miners, Reuters reports with reference to the Xinhua State Information Agency. The gas explosion occurred at a mine in the city of Fengchen in the province of Dzyansi and became another terrible incident in a series of explosions, which since the beginning of the year led to the death of 4620 miners in China.

Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and the head of the Palestinian government Ahmed Kureya will hold the first personal meeting not next week, as previously planned, but later. This was reported by informed sources in the office of the Israeli Prime Minister. Initially, representatives of both governments confirmed that the meeting should take place after the completion of Sharon's visit to Italy, from where he returns on Wednesday.

The Russian Museum begins the unique comprehensive program "Russia". On November 21, in Nizhny Novgorod, the first of the Russian cities, the opening of the exhibition 'Three centuries of Russian art' from the collection of the State Russian Museum will be held. Among the exhibits of the exhibition are works of the XVIII, XIX and XX centuries.

In American Houston, the final male tennis tournament of the year Masters Cup, whose prize fund is 3 million 700 thousand dollars. Last night, three matches were played in Moscow time. In the "red" group, German Rainer Shuttler defeated American Andy Roddik and secured a place in the semifinals of the tournament. His rival will become Andre Agassi, who in the match of the "blue" group was stronger than the Argentinean David Nalbandan.

In New York, celebrations began in honor of the 100th anniversary and completion of the restoration of the oldest Orthodox church in the United States-the Holy Nicolaev Patriarchal Cathedral.

Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov instructed the head of the Ministry of Natural Resources not to escalate the atmosphere of threats around the Yukos oil company and carry out its inspections "in planned mode". "With regard to creating an atmosphere of threat - I consider it unacceptable," Kasyanov told reporters. He said that the Minister of Natural Resources has already received the necessary instructions.

The defeat of Harry Kasparov ended the second of his four parties in the match against the X3D Fritz computer program. Opponents played the Spanish party. In the complex Mittelshpile, the playing black Kasparov managed to intercept the initiative shortly before Tseutnot. However, the fate of the party was decided on the 32nd move when the ex-champion of the world made a gross mistake by the black champion, missing the passing central pawn.

Two American troops were killed and three were injured as a result of an explosion of a bomb on the path of their columns to the north of Baghdad, Reuters reports citing the American military. According to the representative of the command, an attack on an American convoy using a home -made explosive device occurred on Thursday in the afternoon in the city of Samarra. The dead served in the operational group "Iron Horse".

The United States may not receive the expected military assistance from its allies in the anti -Irak coalition. On Thursday, Japan said that she was putting aside until next year to send her soldiers to Iraq. This decision was made on the eve of a visit to the country of the US Minister of Defense Donald Ramsfeld and the day after the next major terrorist attack in Iraq. Recall that on Wednesday in the Iraqi city of Nassiria , the barracks of Italian carbines (military police) were blown up .

According to the Welsh press, the Wales team will receive 3 million 300 thousand pounds in case of winning the Russian team in the butt match of the qualifying tournament of the European Championship in 2004. “Everyone knows that we are in such a situation where we can really help both the team and the entire Wales football federation,” said the coach of Welsh Mark Hughes.

Moscow does not want to hear about Chechnya anymore. And on the eve, she began a large -scale offensive, the purpose of which is to silence those who, after last week in Rome in Rome, the EU dared to make comments about his results, today Le Figaro writes, the article published by Inopressa . So, the chairman of the European Parliament Pat Cox criticized the final communique of the summit.

The investigation in the case of the former head of the oil company Yukos Mikhail Khodorkovsky managed to decorate the data of a computer server, seized during one of the searches in October in the village of Zhukovka near Moscow, Interfax reports. “We managed to decorate all the data of the servers that were encoded. The number of data and documents exceeds 70 thousand,” said Natalia Vishnyakova, official representative of the Prosecutor General of the Russian Federation.

It became known the name of the main financier of the Al-Qaeda organization, the mysterious curator of the financial flows of international terrorism, still known as Sheikh Said. According to Al-Hayat, through reliable sources, she managed to find out that behind this pseudonym is the Egyptian Mustafa Abul Yazid, who was still in the case of the murder of Egypt of Egypt, Anvar Sadat in 1981.