‘Following some negotiations, two dealing agreements have been signed with Avtosan and Okami,’ Ford Motor Company’s press officer Ekaterina Kulinenko informed UrBC reporters. Ford chose its new Yekaterinburg dealers as early as September 2009; prior to this, Avtoland Holding had been the car manufacturer’s only representative in the city. ‘Avtosan and Okami have been our official dealers since mid-October. We expect both car centers to start rendering their customers a full range of sales and after-sales services by the end of the year,’ Kulinenko noted.

‘I’m not sure the reopening of Palma-Tours’ office in Pushkin St can actually be taken seriously. I think I’ll wait till the unhappy customers have placed their complaints and then see what conclusions can be made,’ President of Sverdlovsk Region Information and Tourism Center Vadim Viner said to UrBC. The notorious tour operator that used to offer its services to dwellers of Sverdlovsk, Chelyabinsk, and Tyumen Regions and Knanty-Mansiyskiy Autonomous Region had earlier claimed to have gone out of business. The company’s offices closed down about a week ago. However, one of its

Alexander Misharin has by now been adjured and assumed the office of Governor of Sverdlovsk Region. The decision to make him Governor was taken during a joint meeting of the Legislative Assembly’s both chambers in Yekaterinburg on November 23, 2009. In fact, the initial decision to this extent was made during a joint meeting on November 17, 2009 when Misharin was presented to the deputies by Plenipotentiary Representative of Russian Federation President in Ural Federal District Nikolai Vinnichenko. The second meeting was attended by the Russian Federation Transport Minister Igor Levitin (who

The Federal Financial Market Service decided to annul the licenses allowing Pervouralsk-based Universal Commercial Bank to perform brokerage and dealing operations on the securities market. This decision was made after the bank’s banking operation license had been declared invalid by the Central Bank of the Russian Federation’s order OD-684 as of October 28, 2009.

‘The profit resulting from selling Sverdlovsk Region’s 185-million-ruble share in Europe Business Center is expected to make up the lion’s share of the total revenues (that is, 227 million RUR) that came from selling public property to private owners in 2009. I believe the current owner of the business center is the most likely customer for this share,’ says Sverdlovsk Region Public Property Management Minister Alexei Molotkov. ‘The same is true of Uspenskiy Mall. Some of its assets are managed by the regional unitary enterprise that has been allowed by the regional authorities to sell the