Rusal is the first to cut staff Yesterday, Russian Aluminum announced a reduction in head office staff by a quarter. In addition, according to the Vremya Novostei newspaper, starting from November, salaries will be reduced by 23% at all the company's aluminum plants. The unpopular measures will allow Rusal to save up to $6.5 million monthly. The company's management explains the need for tough steps by the unfavorable market conditions - falling world prices and falling demand for aluminum.

VimpelCom (Bee Line trademark) continues to develop the GSM 900/1800 cellular network in Moscow and the Moscow region. Over the past year, VimpelCom has launched more than 300 base stations, and yesterday put into operation the thousandth. At the same time, unlike its main competitor, Mobile TeleSystems (MTS), which prefers to operate its towers alone, VimpelCom has allowed the new metropolitan GSM operator Sonic Duo to join its infrastructure.

Sales tax will live for two years The Duma revived the sales tax, which could lose its force next year, as required by the Constitutional Court. Having approved amendments to the tax legislation yesterday in the second reading, deputies implemented the January resolution of the Constitutional Court, exempting individual entrepreneurs from paying this tax.

It's time for Lokomotiv to think about the UEFA Cup After losing to the Italian Roma (0:1), the capital's Lokomotiv lost all chances of advancing to the next stage from Group A. However, Semin's team still has the opportunity to extend its European season. To do this, Loko needs to take third place in the group, which gives the right to play in the UEFA Cup.

The Russian rhythmic gymnastics team is going to the World Championships for the first time, having three full-fledged contenders for victory: Alina Kabaeva, Irina Chashchina and Leysan Utyasheva. On the eve of the tournament, Vremya Novostei newspaper correspondent Olga ERMOLINA spoke with the head coach of the national team, Irina VINER. How was the preparation for the world championship in Madrid, and what shape are our athletes in? - We prepared for the World Cup very seriously.

The recent mania for sending letters containing suspicious powder is becoming increasingly widespread in Moscow. True, in our country, unlike the USA, where attackers spread anthrax spores in this way, everything turns out to be a stupid joke. On Tuesday alone, three cases of detection of “bad” letters were recorded in the capital.

Mikhail Shcherbachenko became chairman of the board of directors of the TV company “TV Stolitsa”. His predecessor was Sergei Blagovolin, who died in September of this year. Previously, Mr. Shcherbachenko worked at Stroitelnaya Gazeta, the Trud newspaper, Rossiyskaya Gazeta, was the editor-in-chief of Megapolis magazine, and also worked on television. Since 1997, he served as deputy head of the Moscow City Hall press center and editor-in-chief of the Moscow City Hall Bulletin magazine.

The Ministry of Internal Affairs will approach migration in a new way The Ministry of Federation Affairs, National and Migration Policy is probably the most unlucky Russian department. Over the past nine years, it has been reorganized and renamed several times, and nine leaders have changed during this time. Alexander Blokhin, appointed in January 2000, also did not stay in the ministerial chair. Actually, rumors that Mr.

Deputies are fighting for money from working pensioners The Duma once again stood up for working pensioners in defiance of everyone: the Pension Fund, the Ministry of Labor, the government and the president. 320 Duma members voted yesterday in the first reading that, from November 1, all working pensioners would be paid their pensions in full. There were 74 people “against”, 72 of them were Unity deputies.

APEC Forum Organizers Defend Identity A two-day meeting of the ministers of foreign affairs and trade of the member countries of the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) organization ends today in Shanghai. The leaders are taking up the baton: today in the evening, US and Russian Presidents George Bush and Vladimir Putin will arrive at hourly intervals.

According to ITAR-TASS, citing the newspaper "Addresseavisen" (Trondheim), some skiers of the Norwegian team, fearing terrorist attacks, intend to refuse to participate in the 2002 Winter Olympic Games in Salt Lake City, or at least in the opening ceremony of the Olympics. We are not talking about the entire team, but only about its individual representatives.

The musical “Nord-Ost” appeared in Moscow The project seemed doomed in advance to success with the public and failure with critics. Some people little known in theater circles (Alexey Ivashchenko and Georgy Vasiliev) wrote something like that, and what’s more, they staged it themselves.

Sales of new foreign cars in Russia are growing rapidly In Russia there is an explosion of consumer demand for new foreign-made cars. Over the nine months of this year, the world's largest manufacturers sold 2.5 times more foreign cars through representative offices and official dealers than during the same period last year. The total sales volume of foreign cars of 16 brands for three quarters amounted to 31,111 units compared to 12,942 for the same period in 2000.

Itera will explain to Georgia whose peacekeepers are better Yesterday, the international group of companies Itera warned Georgia about a possible reduction of 50% in the volume of gas supplied to Georgia from October 20. Officially, this is explained by chronic non-payments, but Tbilisi has already given the event a political overtone.

The US House of Representatives yesterday, at the second attempt, but almost unanimously approved an act tightening measures to combat money laundering. The Senate passed it a week ago as part of the anti-terrorism bill, but congressmen then withdrew the “laundering” part. The Republican majority of the House of Representatives has never had a heart for newfangled measures to combat money laundering: there is no point in assigning police functions to banks, they say.