Following Governor of Chelyabinsk Region Petr Sumin’s decision, the regional administration for physical education, sports, and travel was transformed into a ministry in the hope of helping it deal with the mass and professional sports development in the region more effectively. The current head of the organization Yuri Stepkin will keep on working as the ministry’s top official. The new Minister reports they are planning to support Chelyabinsk Region’s team during this year’s Olympics. Ten local athletes have already been presented with trips to Beijing. The Ministry has been coordinating

Eleven ambassadors extraordinary and plenipotentiary of Russia to several different countries are going to visit Yekaterinburg’s future Academic district’s construction site on July 11, 2008. The visits of this kind are coordinated by the Russian Federation Ministry of Foreign Affairs in order to give the Russian ambassadors a chance to get acquainted with the Russian regions’ economic and cultural potential. Once every two years, the Russian Federation President holds two-day meetings with the ambassadors, whereupon they begin traveling around the Russian provinces. The agenda of the

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by VUZ Bank to private individuals for 31 to 90 days dropped by 100% (from 5 million RUR to zero) in January-May 2008.

Maxi Group’s Board of Directors decided to coordinate an extraordinary general meeting of the company’s shareholders on September 5, 2008. The main point on the proposed agenda is the early termination of Maxi Group’s BOD members’ powers and electing the new Board of Directors.

Central Bank of Russia reports volume of loans given by Ural Innovational Commercial Bank to private individuals for 181 days to 1 year went down by 88.63% (from 9.206 million RUR to 1.046 million RUR) in January-May 2008.

Expert-Ural came up with its rating of best websites among the Urals and Western Siberia’s thirty largest banks. SKB-Bank’s online office was featured in several top positions at once, the bank’s press officer reports. The magazine has compiled its rating of banks’ websites for the third time this year. Expert’s analysts report they’ve used quite a new ranking technique this time, though. For one, several parameters were discarded as unnecessary, while a few categories were united into subgroups like graphics, e-banking services, etc. Besides, the design and navigation ease played a more

‘The number of chartered flights to Turkey available on Sverdlovsk Region’s market tends to go down lately. The main reason for this is the fact that the supply outstrips the demand at the moment; besides, Vasco and Detour’s recent bankruptcy was a factor, too,’ says Inna Tour Travel Agency’s Director Inna Averyanova. ‘For one, flights that were supposed to have been offered by More Travel, Coral Travel, and Orange Tour on Friday had to be cancelled. Several hundred seats remained unused altogether,’ she notes.

Ural Federal District’s division of Rostechnadzor (the state environmental, technological, and nuclear safety watchdog) is going to inspect the compliance of Sinara Pipe Plant (based in Kamensk-Uralskiy, Sverdlovsk Region) with the industrial safety and energy preparedness requirements. The inspection is to last until July 11, 2008. Severskiy Pipe Plant (based in Polevskoy, Sverdlovsk Region) is to undergo a similar inspection on July 14-18, 2008, the spokesperson for Ural Federal District’s division of Rostechnadzor reports. The inspections will touch upon the issues of obeying the federal

Moscow, 8 July 2008 -љ UC RUSAL, the world’s largest aluminium and alumina producer and 25% shareholder in Norilsk Nickel, is issuing the following statement in relation to the results of the first meeting of the new Norilsk Nickel Board of Directors which was held on 7 July 2008.љ The decisions made at this meeting demonstrate that the Board is controlled by Interros and does not represent the interests of all shareholders. The first meeting of the Board of Directors of Norilsk Nickel did not comply with the practices used by public companies.љ It was called by Interros on one working

COMSTAR OTS (LSE: CMST) acquired a 100% shareholding in Strategia, a company which, in its turn, owns 100% of Ural Telephone Company, Yekaterinburg and Sverdlovsk Region’s second most important telephone operator. The price of Strategia’s 100% shareholding in Ural Telephone Company comes to 1,015 million RUR ($43.4m). The spokesperson for COMSTAR reports Strategia was bought from a private proprietor rather than a legal entity. Ural Telephone Company offers private customers and businesses local and area network telephone connection as well as broadband Internet access (based on ADSL and