Tomorrow's newspapers write: The government began to fulfill its program. Yesterday, Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Kudrin said that next year loans will no longer be issued from the budget. Neither agriculture, nor industry. This can be called a new budget revolution. The results of the elections of the Governor of the Samara region who have passed on July 2 can be revised.

Another general decided to speak out about the Kursk disaster. The death of the submarine "will not affect the decrease in the combat potential of the Northern Fleet" - in such words, Interfax reports, the first deputy chief of the General Staff, Yuri Baluevsky, reassured the public.

At an informal CIS summit, Putin met with Lukashenko, Eduard Shevarnadze, President of Moldova Peter Luchinsky, Nursultan Nazarbayev and Emomali Rakhmonov. The presidents did not make any unexpected statements. The topic of meetings was the issues of creating and developing the free trade zone and cooperation within the framework of a single defense space.

Yesterday at about 20:00 Moscow time in the Center's supermarket in the Old City of Riga, two powerful explosions thundered with an interval of several minutes. At least 21 people were injured, three are in serious condition (Interfax reports 38 wounded, of which four are in intensive care). Among the victims is the head of the Latvian Criminal Police, Valdis Pumbers, but his colleagues doubt that he was the main goal of the organizers of the explosion, the BBC reports.

On Sunday, August 20, in Chechnya, they will choose a deputy in the State Duma. Provisional administration officials report about one hundred percent readiness of polling stations. Extremely high figures of the alleged voter turnout are called up to 70 percent. There will be no independent observers in the elections. The military report that with the approach of this date the situation in the rebellious republic is complicated.

According to RIA Novosti sources in the Russian delegation at an informal meeting of the heads of the CIS state, it is possible that some changes can still occur in the Vladimir Putin stay program. This will depend, the sources believe on the development of the situation with the victim of the Kursk submarine accident. It is significant that on the vacation of Putin in Sochi the Kursk disaster did not affect.

The military nevertheless managed to lobby through the Ministry of Finance to preserve the previous level of financing as a percentage of GDP. The Ministry of Finance says that Putin personally made such a decision. Recall that until recently, Deputy Prime Minister Kudrin spoke of a decrease in the budget-2001 share of military spending from 2.7% to 2.2%.

Chairman of the Central Election Commission Alexander Veshnyakov says that there is no need for a cardinal change in the election system to the Duma. At the same time, it needs to be made "serious adjustments." So, in the elections, according to Veshnyakov, only political parties of the “all -Russian scale” and a democratic sense should participate (that is, it is, in fact, about double qualifying), and the decision to create such organizations should be made collegial.

The rescue operation at the site of the Kursk disaster continues and is associated with a great risk to rescuers: the agency reports that when descent, one of the bathyscaphees is seriously damaged and was raised in a “catastrophic state”. Interfax gives the opinion of the officers of the headquarters of the Northern Fleet, who believe that from the moment of the accident before the collision of the submarine with the seabed, no more than a minute has passed.

The prolonged confrontation between RAO "UES" and the Ministry of Railways can - at least temporarily - stop. The General Director of the MPS Center for Public Relations Leonid Komarov said that RAO "UES" obliged to withdraw a telegram sent to its regional units with a request to disconnect the railway workers for debts.

Trading Russian shares in the RTS opened up by increasing price levels, especially for oil Blue Chips, but in the afternoon the trend changed. As a result, the market, which grew over the first hour of trading by about 2-3%, closed a decrease in prices by an average of 1-3%. RTS consolidated index decreased by 0.34% to the level of 223.61 points; At the same time, the volume of trading according to the results of the session amounted to only $ 12 million.

According to RIA Novosti, three tanks with diesel fuel are on fire at the Kapotnya oil refinery in southeast Moscow. The fire was assigned the fifth complexity number. Several fire brigades are trying to contain the flames.

Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Kudrin decided to clarify to the public the strange situation that has developed around the salaries of public sector employees: while the tax target is exceeded on a monthly basis, wage arrears continue to grow.

After the unambiguous statement of Deputy Prime Minister Viktor Khristenko, that the government supports all Slavneft's plans for the reconstruction of Yaroslavneftesinteza, Map decided not to sit back. As you know, this reconstruction (for which Slavneft was started by the additional ministry) was blocked by shareholders affiliated with TNCs (in their hands 34.1% of the shares of Janos).

Following the minimum vigor and the Ministry of Economic Development, the Ministry of Restoring the concept of restructuring was expressed by the Ministry of RECUSTURE was expressed by the Ministry of Antimonopoly Policy. In Mapa, it is believed that in general, the draft concept for the development of structural reform of railway transport does not contradict the main areas and principles of restructuring the industry.