Russia’s Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov, on the photo, has announced today he handed in the cabinet’s resignation to President Vladimir Putin.
Photo: Dmitry Dukhanin
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Russia’s PM Steps Down
Russia’s Prime Minister Mikhail Fradkov has announced today he handed in the cabinet’s resignation to President Vladimir Putin, RIA Novosti reported.
According to Fradkov, Putin should be given "free hand in making the choice, including about the staff” on the threshold of vital political events, elections to the Sate Duma and presidential elections.
”I think I'd rather come up with initiative and vacate the office of government chairman so that you will have no restrictions whatsoever when deciding about building the power configuration,” Fradkov told the president.
Putin accepted Fradkov’s resignation, but asked him to remain acting PM until the State Duma confirms appointment of a new prime minister.
The most probable successor to Fradkov is First Vice Premier Sergey Ivanov, Vedomosti reported some time earlier.
The cabinet’s resignation is driving down the market quotes. By 3:00 p.m., MSK, the RTS index lost 0.48 percent to 1,903.02, and MICEX sank 0.66 percent to 1,637.85. Quite a few blue chips suffered the losses. RAO UES of Russia, for instance, dropped 1.5 percent, LUKOIL went down 0.8 percent and Sberbank lost more than 0.5 percent.
www.kommersant.com
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