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Yesterday in Brief for March 20, 2006
(Interfax News Agency Via Thomson Dialog NewsEdge)The following is a digest of headline news from March 17 to 11:30 a.m. on March 20: PUTIN, BARROSO DISCUSS ENERGY SECURITY, KEY INTERNATIONAL ISSUES
President Vladimir Putin and European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso focused on energy security and key international problems at a meeting in Moscow on Friday, the Kremlin said on Saturday.
"It appears that the parties paid their closest attention
to the
issue of achieving energy security for the world and to
thestrengthening and diversification of relations between Russia and the EU in the energy industry," Kremlin aide Sergei Yastrzhembsky, the president's commissioner for relations with the EU, told Interfax.
"The Russian side emphasized that, in many fields, primarily the energy industry, the EU is a long-time, key and priority partner for us. Russia intends to continue to meet its commitments on energy exports to EU countries," the Kremlin commissioner said. RUSSIAN- ISRAEL GAS DEAL MAY BE SIGNED IN 2007
Gazprom and the Israeli government have agreed a deal for shipments of Russian gas to Israel via Turkey starting from 2007, acting Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told Ekho Moskvy radio on Sunday evening.
"I believe that in a year we will be able to sign an agreement on the delivery of Russian gas to Israel, after which we will build a gas pipeline transiting Turkey," the acting prime minister said. CNPC BACKS ROSNEFT IPO FOR STRATEGIC REASONS - CHEN
China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) supports Rosneft's initial public offering (IPO) for strategic reasons, CNPC President Chen Geng said in an exclusive interview with Interfax-China.
"CNPC is interested in stepping up cooperation with Rosneft in various forms," Chen said, when asked whether CNPC plans to purchase Rosneft shares after the Russian oil company's IPO and whether its stock could be acquired in a deal involving India's ONGC. CHECHEN GOVT SEEKS CONTROLLING STAKE IN GROZNEFTEGAZ
An expanded Chechen parliamentary session decided on Saturday to ask the Russian federal government to transfer a 2% stake in the local oil and gas company Grozneftegaz to the ownership of the Chechen government, which would allow it to raise a controlling stake of 51% in the company.
The meeting, attended by members of the Chechen Council of the Republic, People's Assembly, and the government, as well as oil experts, also decided to request the transfer of the federal state unitary enterprise Chechenneftekhimprom into the Chechen republic's ownership for further inclusion into the charter capital of Grozneftegaz.
"The oil sector is crucial for the Chechen budget, and therefore we demand that Rosneft's activity in Chechnya be absolutely transparent," said Dukvakha Abdurakhmanov, chairman of the Chechen People's Assembly.
Chechnya is interested in increasing its budget revenues, Abdurakhmanov said. "Rosneft earns over 17 billion rubles from the sale of oil produced in Chechnya, while no more than 30 million rubles is sent back to Chechnya," he said. UK CONCERNED THAT HERMITAGE CAPITAL CEO DENIED ENTRY TO RUSSIA
Britain has expressed concern that Hermitage Capital Management CEO William Browder has been denied entry to Russia and urged the Russian authorities to revise the decision, a diplomat from the UK Embassy to Russia told Interfax on Friday.
A number of foreign media reported earlier on Friday that Browder had been denied entry into Russia since mid-November 2005.
The diplomat said Browder had been visiting Russia for years and is managing assets in the country worth billions.
He admitted that a decision on this issue is undeniably a
Russian
prerogative, but the UK would like to understand its
reasons andtherefore urged the Russian authorities to revise the issue, as the two countries are pursuing a common goal of improving trade relations.
Mr Browder, Hermitage Capital Management and HSBC bank are key elements in these relations, he said. ROSOBORONEXPORT DISCUSSING PURCHASE OF VSMPO-AVISMA SHARES
State arms trader Rosoboronexport is discussing the purchase of shares in VSMPO-Avisma Corporation, the world's biggest milled titanium producer, Sergei Chemezov, Rosoboronexport's general director, said at a briefing in St. Petersburg.
"We are in talks. I can't say when [they will be wrapped
up],"
Chemezov said. "We want to buy as big a stake as possible - at
least ablocking stake - from existing shareholders."
The 60% of VSMPO-Avisma that is owned by shareholders Vyacheslav Bresht and Vladislav Tetyukhin is thought to be worth $1 billion. ALL PASSENGERS EVACUATED AFTER MOSCOW METRO TUNNEL COLLAPSE
All passengers trapped in the Moscow metro after a section of a tunnel collapsed on Sunday were successfully evacuated.
"All the people have been rescued. Nobody has been killed or injured," Emergency Situations Ministry spokesman Viktor Beltsov told Interfax.
The incident occurred at the metro section between the Voikovskaya and Sokol stations. CIS & BALTICS LUKASHENKO ELECTED BELARUSSIAN PRESIDENT
Alexander Lukashenko has been elected president with 82.6% of the votes, Central Elections Commission head Lidiya Yermoshina said after all the ballots at the Belarussian presidential elections were finally processed.
According to Central elections commission data, 82.6% voted for Lukashenko in the Brest region, 82.9% in the Vitebsk region, 83.8% in the Grodno region, 90.3% in the Gomel region, 81% in the Minsk region, 88.5% in the Mogilev region and 70.7% in Minsk.
The runner-up at the elections was Alexander Milinkevich, who collected 6% of the votes.
Sergei Gaidukevich got 3.2% and Alexander Kozulin collected 3.2% of the votes. MILINKEVICH WILL FIGHT FOR NON-RECOGNITION OF ELECTIONS' RESULTS
Belarussian opposition presidential candidate Alexander Milinkevich believes the Belarussian presidential elections' early results have been fabricated.
"The Belarussian authorities are happily reporting that 90% of the voters voted for [Alexander] Lukashenko. It is a lie," Milinkevich said, in a speech on Minsk's Oktyabrskaya Square.
"We will fight for the elections' results to be proclaimed illegitimate, we will use international structures, among other thing," Milinkevich said.
Milinkevich and another Belarussian presidential candidate, Alexander Kozulin, marched to the Pobedy Square in Minsk at the head of a column of their supporters on Sunday night.
Milinkevich called on his supporters to lay flowers to the World War II monuments at the square and go home. "The police is on our side, it will not carry out the authorities' orders," Milinkevich said.
He called on his supporters to come to Minsk's central square on Monday evening, "when the real results of the elections are announced." UKRAINIAN FOREIGN MINISTER WANTS GOVERNMENT TO CONSIDER EU BID
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Borys Tarasyuk has said he intends to initiate government hearings in the second part of the year on drawing up a bid for Ukraine's entry into the European Union.
"I expect that we will be prepared to draft such proposals
for the
government in the second half of the year," Tarasyuk said
whilstreturning from Austria, where he was on an official visit.
The implementation of a Ukraine-EU action plan will be analyzed in the second half of the year, Tarasyuk said. "In addition, we ourselves should estimate how this plan is being implemented in our country, because we have commitments inside the country," he said. GEORGIAN MPS HEADED FOR MOSCOW FOR CONSULTATIONS
A Georgian parliamentary delegation led by Deputy Speaker Mikhail Machavariani left for Moscow on Sunday for consultations with Russian colleagues on a wide range of Georgian-Russian relations.
"We would like to hear first-hand information from the
Russian
parliament on ways to settle the conflicts in Abkhazia and
theTskhinvali district," Machavariani told the press before departing for Moscow.
Consultations will "hopefully soothe the strained bilateral relations," he said.
Meanwhile, opposition deputies in the Georgian
parliament had
expressed their disagreement with the decision to send to
Moscow adelegation made up exclusively of members of the parliamentary majority. AZERBAIJAN DISOWNS STATEMENTS AFTER PROTESTS FROM IRAN
The Azerbaijani government distanced itself on Saturday from recent statements at a world congress of ethnic Azeris in Baku that disputed Iran's sovereignty over Azeri lands Russia ceded to Iran in the early 19th century, statements that evoked an official protest from Iran on Friday.
"Some of the speeches at the second world Azeri congress
alarmed
the Iranian side. In this connection, I state that, since it
was acongress of public organizations, all the ideas that were voiced at it are their personal opinions," Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry spokesman Tair Tagizade told Interfax.
"Relations between Iran and Azerbaijan are friendly and good- neighborly; They are based on principles reflected in documents signed by the heads of our states, and they remain unchanged," Tagizade said.
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