Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin at a meeting of the government
Photo: Sergey Mikheev
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Govt. Hears Antimonopoly Measures
Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, the five deputy prime ministers and the key economic ministers held their first official discussion on Federal Antimonopoly Service director Igor Artemyev’s initiative to tighten antimonopoly legislation. The package of amendments met with cautious acceptance. Work on it will continue through the end of next month. The only concrete result of the meeting was Artemyev’s announcement of the fine for the Mechel company, which will be 5 percent of its annual turnover, that is, 790 million rubles, for artificially raising prices for its products. The prime minister noted “positive movement” among producers of raw materials for the metals industry.
The prime minster was joined at the residence in Novo-Ogarevo by Artemyev and Deputy Prime Ministers Viktor Zubkov, Igor Shuvalov, Sergey Sobyanin, Alexey Kudrin and Igor Sechin. Minister of Economic Development Elvira Nabiullina and Minister of Industry and Trade Viktor Khristenko were present as well. The prime minister acknowledged the shortcomings of the earlier round of what he called “manual management” on the metallurgical market, which cost the Russian stock market 7 percent of its capitalization in a matter of hours. He called for the creation of “a system that would regulate the situation on the market… fairly and rationally.”
The version of the new package of legislation seen by Kommersant contains norms aimed at retail chains, which were exempted from the draft law “On Trade” at the insistence of Shuvalov and Khristenko. Artemyev has also proposed a ban on “abuse of influence” not only for monopolists, but for companies that are not dominant in their markets as well. If the package is approved, companies will face fines of up to 15 percent of their turnover for violations. The participants in the meeting were subdued in their comments afterwards. Artemyev acknowledged that his proposals were met not without reservations, but this was “only the first discussion.” Nabiullina said that the FAS’ functions may be expanded.
www.kommersant.com
All the Article in Russian as of Aug. 20, 2008
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