VLADIMIR PUTIN
ARCHIVE OF THE OFFICIAL SITE
OF THE 2008-2012 PRIME MINISTER
OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
VLADIMIR PUTIN
ARCHIVE OF THE OFFICIAL SITE
OF THE 2008-2012 PRIME MINISTER
OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION
VLADIMIR PUTIN
US President George Bush is not the only man who has a costly plan to bail out the financial sector. A similar, albeit somewhat cheaper, plan has been offered by the Russian Government. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin made it clear yesterday that he was trying hard to disperse the clouds gathering over not only the American and European, but also the Russian economies.
Vladimir Putin announced unprecedented measures to support the financial system yesterday. The Central Bank will transfer about $50 billion to the Foreign Economic Bank (VEB) from gold and currency reserves. It will be used to issue loans to companies that are unable to pay back foreign credits.
The Bank of Russia has been told to issue unsecured stabilisation loans to the banking system, and Vnesheconombank (VEB) should pitch-in to solve the problems of the corporate sector, for which it will be issued $50 billion to refinance companies' credits. The decisions were made yesterday during a meeting at Prime Minister Vladimir Putin's office. The cost of the issue is at least 8% of the Central Bank reserves and a possible downgrade in the country's credit rating. Economists are sure that these actions will only be able to keep Russia's financial problems at bay until the end of the year.
The meeting of the Government Presidium, which was scheduled to discuss the plan for Russia's long-term development submitted by the Ministry of the Economy, has been canceled. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin gave another 48 hours to end the disputes over Plan-2020, which has been in the works since 2006.
Vladimir Putin met the head coach of the St Petersburg Zenit football squad, Dick Advocaat, on Saturday. The two men agreed that politicians and coaches are doomed to loneliness. Kommersant's special correspondent ANDREI KOLESNIKOV believes they should have included journalists in that list. He is sure that Dick Advocaat, who was planning to go to Holland, will stay in St Petersburg.
A Just Russia party complained to the prime minister of being oppressed in the State Duma. On Tuesday Vladimir Putin held a meeting with deputies representing this parliamentary party. The MPs explained why they voted against the draft budget, complained of plagiarism in the State Duma and compared the effectiveness of their lawmaking with that of a steam engine.
For the first time in six months the Cabinet met on the fifth floor of the White House after costly repairs had been completed. The Prime Minister's office, private apartment and the government conference hall are all on that floor. The Government Presidium is housed in the former reception room, which has been lavishly refurbished. Having reviewed the efforts of the authorities to deal with the liquidity crisis and stop the fall of stock exchange indexes, the Prime Minister declared that the market had in fact been restored.
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, just back from Sochi, was obviously in an upbeat mood during the Monday meeting of the Cabinet, in spite of all the financial troubles. Before he presented himself to the full Presidium in the revamped office he had gone into a huddle with Central Bank President Sergei Ignatyev, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Alexei Kudrin, the Minister of Telecommunications and Mass Communications Igor Shchyogolev, and then again with Mr Kudrin.
Prime Minister Vladimir Putin moved into a new office in September, as planned. Yesterday he moved from the third to the fifth floor, into the refurbished Prime Minister's area to chair the first meeting of the Government Presidium after his leave to review the stock market crisis. In the new and brighter office the financial crisis looked as good as over.
Late Thursday night, Vladimir Putin held a meeting with the top executives of major international companies, including Deutsche Bank, Siemens AG, Mitsubishi, Chevron, BP and other participants of the Sochi International Investment Forum.
