Mikhail Shreer, Criminal Offenses Director of Yekaterinburg Department of Internal Affairs, announced at a press conference that 945 cars were stolen and 1,178 cars were hijacked in Yekaterinburg last year. ‘We managed to solve 96 cases related to car theft or hijacking in 2006 and 89 cases out of 1,011 in 2005,’ Mr. Shreer said. ‘Automobiles are usually stolen from ‘half-legal’ parking areas and from parking lots provided by trade centers. The most commonly stolen cars are VAZ-made ones and Toyota Land Cruiser and Toyota RAV4,’ he observed.

Alexander Jakob, First Deputy Mayor of Yekaterinburg, has recently conducted a meeting devoted to town planning prospects in 2007. The main point on the agenda concerned the prospective network of trunk roads. There are thrice as many cars in the city today as in 1900; the total length of the urban roads comes to 880.1 kilometers, which is obviously not enough. The improvement committee is planning to construct another 44.2 kilometers of roads in the near future, including nine interchanges; in addition, a number of streets is to be restored. Pulvimixer is still to be used as the primary

‘Koltsovo airport of Yekaterinburg is trying to impugn our order regarding the airport’s refusal to provide Ural Airlines with the slots for winter flights from Yekaterinburg to Moscow and back,’ says the spokesperson for Federal Antimonopoly Service in Sverdlovsk Region. The Service earlier stated that Kotsovo airport had been violating the antimonopoly law when refusing the carrier the so-called historic slots in winter. The airport said back then that due to overhaul of check-in zones 1 and 2 and leasing of zones 5 and 6 meant for domestic flights they couldn’t service too many passengers

‘Our regional division received a large number of complaints regarding bank loans; a great part of these complaints concerned Russian Standard Bank,’ Elena Bogacheva of Rospotrebnadzor (the state consumer rights watchdog) in Sverdlovsk Region announced at a recent press conference. ‘This company is now involved in an administrative suit; we’ve asked the bank for a number of documents in order to analyze the data and support or refute the claim as to their violating consumer rights,’ Ms Bogacheva said. ‘One can name the most common complaints that the borrowers come up with: unscrupulous ways

Regional division of Rospotrebnadzor (the state consumer rights watchdog) received 5,337 complaints in writing and 23,000 complaints altogether in 2006. All of last year’s claims amounted to approximately 84 million RUR, Vladimir Gurvich (M.D. and Deputy Chief State Sanitary Inspector in Sverdlovsk Region) announced at a press conference. ‘Our inspections resulted in withdrawing 25 million RUR worth of goods last year; besides, they revealed 14 million RUR worth of low-quality services,’ he said. ‘Our regional division provided 7,000 pieces of professional advice and conducted over 7,000

‘The local mortgage lending market is likely to undergo even more changes in the nearest future. For one, the increase in demand for loans taken to buy places in the suburbs of the city will soon slow down or stop altogether. The potential borrowers’ income makes it impossible for them to acquire a dwelling even on a mortgage; besides, the demand has been affected by some realtors setting unfairly high prices. An apartment, for example, may be offered for 3.2 million RUR whereas it really costs 2.7 million,’ Nikolai Gunchenko of Gunchenko & Co. Real Estate Ltd. said to UrBC. Sverdlovsk

Severnaya Kazna, one of the local banks, explained the idea behind the recent redistribution of shares among the company’s shareholders via the corporate website. (Members of the Board of Directors Pavel Chernavin and Rais Garifulin, the bank’s second largest and fourth largest shareholders respectively, have recently sold their 19% and 5% share holdings). The company’s online forum placed a notice on the changes in the shareholder structure signed by Chairman Andrei Volchik. Mr. Volchik observes that these changes have to do with the differing interests of the bank’s major shareholders, that

‘I believe one should be very careful with the idea of setting up a few more Auchan supermarkets in Sverdlovsk Region; the same applies to any large supermarkets in general. The thing is, it is quite dangerous trying to catch up with the West on the number of square meters of trade areas per 1,000 citizens without taking into account any other factors,’ Alexei Podolyako of Alliance Non-Commercial Partnership said to UrBC. The management of Auchan was reported to mention their intention of setting up four or five new supermarkets in the region in the course of a meeting with Governor Eduard

The licensing department of Russian Federation Federal Tourism Agency is going to set up the Federal Register of all travel agents. ‘We have received no applications so far, but I suppose all the agents will be able to apply in time,’ says Vladimir Strzhalkovskiy, Agency CEO. The new legislation states registering is now obligatory for all travel agents; according to this law, the travel agents must bear certain financial responsibility for their services; it also clarifies the ways and methods of state control over them as well as provides some new legal terms and explains how the services

A conference devoted to joint mortgage project of Sverdlovsk Gubernskiy Bank and Aston Group was held in Yekaterinburg on March 14, 2007. The mortgage scheme is going to be available beginning from March 2007. The event was attended by the bank’s Chairman Alexander Ivanov, the U.S. Consul General in Yekaterinburg John Stepanchuk, Aston Group Chairman Vyacheslav Trapesnikov, and some reporters. The agenda of the conference covered some general issues as well as those devoted to problems connected with mortgage loans, mortgages for new buildings, and the cooperation prospects of Sverdlovsk

According to the annual report of the Interstate Aviation Committee for 2006, there were 33 air crashes in the countries joining the intergovernmental Agreement on Civil Aviation and Air Space Use last year. Ural Airlines had no accidents in 2006, reports their press officer. The data given in this report can be further proved by JACDEC (the Jet Airliner Crash Data Evaluation Centre) research findings: they say Ural Airlines is one of Russia’s safest carriers. JACDEC has been investigating air crashes and publishing annual reports on the global carriers’ safety level since 1973. Normally,

Federal Antimonopoly Service in Sverdlovsk Region is going to consider the suit of Noviy Grad (the local developer) regarding violation of advertising law on March 29, 2007. The developer placed an ad with BLIZKO.RU magazine on December 6, 2006 promising to offer winter holiday discounts on the price of a flat between December 4 and December 29, 2006. Each customer was promised a discount, a present, and an all-prize lottery participation with prizes distributed at the company’s office. The prizes would be drawn using the first installment receipts. Federal Antimonopoly Service sent an

‘Pavel Chernavin and Rais Garifulin’s selling their share holdings and Severnaya Kazna Leasing Company Ltd. becoming the bank’s shareholder means Severnaya Kazna is preparing for an auction. This is likely to happen even earlier than I had expected, that is, before the end of 2007,’ claims Vitaliy Kalugin, Assets Manager of Unicom Partner Investment Company. ‘If these shares are eventually acquired by Chairman Vladimir Frolov from Severnaya Kazna Leasing Company Ltd., the bank may be sold shortly after the semiannual account,’ Mr. Kalugin says. ‘Should the leasing company wish to keep the

According to the bank’s official report, Severnaya Kazna has recently redistributed its shares among the company’s shareholders. Chairman of the Supervisory Board Andrei Volchik increased his share in the bank’s authorized capital from 4.021% to 10.024%, or by 5.003%. Member of the Board of Directors Rais Garifulin sold his 5.002% share and ceased to be the bank’s shareholder. Severnaya Kazna Leasing Company Ltd. became the new stockholder through acquiring a 19.028% holding from Member of the Board of Directors Pavel Chernavin, whose share in the bank’s authorized capital now comes to 0%.

According to the bank’s official report, Severnaya Kazna has recently redistributed its shares among the company’s shareholders. The report, which is an obligatory thing to produce if the company takes any steps that could influence the price of its stock, was published on March 14, 2007; it says that Member of the Board of Directors Pavel Chernavin reduced his share in the bank’s authorized capital from 19.028% to 0%. Member of the Board of Directors Rais Garifulin sold his 5.002% share and ceased to be the bank’s shareholder. According to the corporate website, Mr. Chernavin was the second

Governor of Sverdlovsk Region Eduard Rossel commented on the recent visit of a group of Russian executives headed by Minister for Trade and Economic Development Hermann Gref to France. The Governor himself took part in MIPIM 2007 (Europe’s leading international investment exhibition) that was held in Cannes on March 13, 2007. According to the Governor’s press officer, Mr. Rossel had a chance to meet the management of Auchan, the retail supermarket chain, and to discuss the future development of the company in the Urals. The management was reported to be considering setting up four or five new

Owing to the upcoming overhaul of check-in zones 1 and 2 of Koltsovo airport used for domestic flights, they will be closed down on March 15, 2007. The decision was taken by the airport management because of the order of Yekaterinburg State Fire Surveillance Department regarding the need for the immediate closing down of these zones. All the flights that used to be serviced there will now have to use the remaining four sections, reports the airport’s press officer. The Fire Surveillance Department had been examining the premises of the airport in terms of compliance with the fire safety

The regional post offices received more than 5,000 notices of arrival of a foreign citizen at the place of residence in January-March 2007. Yekaterinburg post office received 3,500 notices, the post office of Verkhnyaya Pyshma got about 500, and Pervouralsk post office got 120 notices, reports the spokesperson for the Federal Post in Sverdlovsk Region. The project known as Migration Notices emerged two months ago following the federal legislation on migration records regarding foreign citizens and apatrides signed on July 18, 2006 and the Russian Federation Government Regulation as of January

‘There are four basic factors that play a decisive role when one chooses a mortgage scheme. Firstly, how quickly a bank considers your application and the nominal interest really matter. Secondly, a client wants a bank that would offer them better terms, given especially that the banks tend to become less picky lately. Thirdly, a customer usually wants to get the money on the day the agreement was signed. Finally, clients still see the low interest rates and high upper limits on the amount of money they want to borrow as their top priorities,’ Dmitriy Zhuchkin, Director of KUB Ltd., a real

The Federal Environmental, Technological, and Nuclear Surveillance Agency (aka Rostechnadzor) started scheduled inspections of Mayak Production Association based in Ozersk, Chelyabinsk Region, today, reports their press officer in Ural Federal District. Rostechnadzor officials are going to check how effectively the company complies with the environmental norms and regulations. The same kinds of examinations conducted by the agency’s experts based in Ural Federal District are to take place on the premises of Klyuchevsk Ferroalloys Works and Metallurgical Industrial Complex of Magnitogorsk.