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“A dialog between business and the authorities in the form of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs is over,” Oleg Deripaska, Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Russian Aluminum company and a member of the Bureau of the Russian Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, was quoted as saying by the Izvestia newspaper. He did not elaborate, but everything is clear for many, including Mr. Deripaska’s colleagues from the Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs, the newspaper says. Otherwise, they would not have discussed the problem of losing their influence on the authorities, and they would not have set up a working group to develop ways of overcoming that “crisis”.
The Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs should fully use the opportunity to speak with the Prime Minister. The next such opportunity could be a long way off. Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov decided to dissolve the government’s Council for Entrepreneurship, where big businesses could discuss their urgent problems with the government.
Many top members of the Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs worked in the Council, which was set up by then Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov in 2000 in order to “ensure practical cooperation between federal executive bodies and a broad range of entrepreneurs, the consolidation of their interests and the preparation of proposals on guidelines for economic policy”.
The Council will be replaced by the government’s commission for competition. It seems the Prime Minister will consider today whether to invite some members of the Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs to the new commission, Izvestia concludes.
According to the newspaper, Mikhail Khodorkovsky is still a member of the Board of the Union of Industrialists and Entrepreneurs. He was elected to the Board late last year. Arkady Volsky, President of the Union, said this was an act of solidarity with the jailed businessman. Mr. Khodorkovsky was arrested on fraud and tax evasion charges in October 2003.
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RUSSIA IN FACTS
