In the battle for the post of OIC Secretary General Yesterday in Istanbul, the session of the foreign ministers of the 57 member countries of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) began three hours later than planned. The ministers were tired - the day before, until two o'clock in the morning, the OIC was choosing a new secretary general. This honorary position has been held since 2000 by the Moroccan Abdel-Wahid Belkaziz.

Broadcasters will remain in limbo until September The first meeting of the body that will be responsible for issuing licenses for television and radio broadcasting in Russia showed that the Federal Competition Commission will not begin its work soon. Members of the updated FCC immediately encountered technical difficulties. In addition, there is no complete certainty regarding the personnel composition.

Russia returns to Uzbekistan as an investor and strategic partner Yesterday, Vladimir Putin, having arrived on a working visit to Tashkent, began a four-day trip to Central Asia. He will take part in three summits in a row. Today, the Uzbek capital will host the next meeting of the leaders of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), whose members, in addition to Russia, are China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

Gazprom forgave part of Moldova's debt According to Gazprom's budget, in 2004 the company's management set itself the task of collecting part of the old debts for gas in the amount of $300 million. The concern recently agreed on a significant share of this money with one of the most undisciplined payers - Moldova.

On Tuesday, the Kremlin decided on “its” presidential candidate in Chechnya. As predicted by the Vremya Novostei newspaper , it will be the 46-year-old Minister of Internal Affairs of Chechnya, Alu Alkhanov, who is supported by the son of the murdered Chechen President Akhmat-Khadzhi Kadyrov, Ramzan, and the entire current political elite of the republic.

Timeshare owners turned into cash cows The first details of a new large-scale investigation into scams in the tourism market were announced yesterday by employees of the Investigation Department (ID) of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for the Central Federal District. The police found out that for several years a fraudulent timeshare exchange had been operating in Moscow, and hundreds of people had fallen victim to it.

Mikhail Shvydkoy, former Minister of Culture, now head of the Federal Agency for Culture and Cinematography, is his own man on television. His public career began with work as editor-in-chief of the Culture channel. In 1998, he was appointed chairman of the All-Russian State Television and Radio Broadcasting Company, and while he was Minister Shvydka, he also mastered the profession of a television presenter.

Government At a government meeting on Thursday, Russian Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin and Russian Economic Development and Trade Minister German Gref will present reports on the main characteristics of the draft federal budget for 2005 and for the period up to 2007.

Forecast for the coming days In most of the European territory of Russia, the weather is unstable and uncharacteristic for the summer period. This is due to a powerful high-altitude cyclone that settled in the north-west of European territory. Today, cool weather with rains of varying intensity and duration in the center and north-west of European Russia will continue. But on Friday the weather will improve a little, the clouds will begin to dissipate, and short rains will not occur everywhere.

Yuri Luzhkov allowed Alexander Weinstein to build a hotel on the site of Moscow News The capital's center has been replenished with a major investment project: the fate of the building on Pushkinskaya Square, in which the editorial office of the Moscow News newspaper was located from 1956 to 2003, has finally been determined. Moscow Mayor Yuri Luzhkov yesterday signed an order for the demolition of this building, which is owned by MN-Nedvizhimost LLC, a subsidiary of Moscow News CJSC.

"My name is Paul Marshall Johnson. I am a US citizen," says a blindfolded man in a video that appeared on an Islamist website yesterday. This is the name of the 49-year-old employee of the American airline Lockheed Martin who disappeared last Saturday in the capital of Saudi Arabia, Riyadh.

CLUBS Cleaning Women (Finland). Industrial pop. Three men dressed as businesswomen drum on guitar necks tied to clothes dryers and sing in non-existent languages. The group members claim that they were sent to Earth in the form of cleaners to cleanse it of dirt. Today they are performing in Russia for the second time - they first played five years ago with the group Kolibri, whose members stumbled upon Cleaning Women while touring Finland. June 17 at the Gogol` club, 20.00.

The court found the accusation of human rights activists of inciting religious hatred “non-specific” The accusation against the organizers of the sensational exhibition “Beware of Religion!” suffered its first defeat in inciting national hatred and enmity. Yesterday, the Tagansky District Court returned the criminal case against the director of the Museum.

The State Duma figured out what to do with the Bank of Russia money Deputies found another option for using 80% of the Central Bank's profits, which it transfers to the budget: the head of the State Duma Banking Committee, Vladislav Reznik, proposed giving this money to the deposit insurance fund next year. According to Mr. Reznik, this will increase the stability of the guarantee system created by the Central Bank, and at the same time solve the problems of sterilization of the money supply.

Grandmasters celebrated Tigran Petrosyan's anniversary A magnificent chess festival in honor of the 75th anniversary of the birth of the ninth world champion Tigran Petrosian has ended in Moscow. The team named after the great grandmaster faced the world team. The overall result of the match, which took place in the “six rounds on six boards” format, was 18.5:17.5 in favor of the world team.