Russia, Uruguay ready to cooperate in high biotechnologies.

BUENOS AIRES, June 17 (Itar-Tass) - Russia and Uruguay are ready to
cooperate in the sphere of high biotechnologies, speaker of the Federation
Council upper house of the Russian parliament Sergei Mironov said on
Wednesday after a meeting with Uruguayan President Jose Mujica.
The two countries will cooperate in developing medicines from rare
diseases. "Russia has interesting know-how in this field, so I believe it
is a promising project," Mironov said.
"During the constructive and positive talks with the Uruguayan
president, the parties considered joint projects in geological
prospecting, railway construction and culture. A cultural exchange would
be interesting.
"Russia and Uruguay are of the same opinion that there is an
opportunity and necessity to actively develop cooperation. Uruguay is an
agricultural country that supplies meat the world over. But aside from
importing meat from Uruguay, Russia might be interested in Uruguay's
assistance in livestock breeding," the Federation Council speaker said.
Speaking at an extraordinary session of the committee of permanent
representatives of the Latin American Association of Integration in
Montevideo on Wednesday, Mironov stated that Russia is interested in
cooperation with Latin America in high-tech branches of the economy.
There are good prospects for interaction in such fields as a peaceful
use of nuclear energy, space exploration, aircraft making, communications
and the development of power generation and transport infrastructure.
"Our country's entering the period of modernization and technological
development of the economy creates good pre-requisites for such
cooperation," he said, noting that "Latin American countries are setting
similar tasks."
The development of ties between Russia and Latin American countries
has been given a powerful political impulse in the recent years.
"At present, inter-state contacts between our countries, including at
top level, are rather intensive and substantive. This contributes to the
appearance of important long-term pre-requisites to expand and intensify
economic interaction," the FC speaker said.


.Court looking into regions' right to regulate taxi business.

ST PETERSBURG, June 17 (Itar-Tass) - The Russian Constitutional Court
on Wednesday began to look into whether regions have the right to regulate
taxi business.
Seven cabbies from the Krasnodar and Stavropol territories lodged a
complaint with the Constitutional Court, saying that a Krasnodar Territory
law required additional documents from them, which federal legislation
does not envision.
Taxi drivers have to pay up to several thousand roubles for some
documents, while their colleagues from other regions are unable to obtain
such documents at all. The taxi drivers said this violates the
Constitutional principles of equality and uniformity of legal regulation
in the country.
Small and medium business organizations sided with the taxi drivers.
"The local law limits the freedom of entrepreneurship," they said.
But the Krasnodar administration and legislators believe otherwise.
Spokesman for the governor Pavel Kalensky said the law had been passed
with good intentions as "advance regulation."
The Prosecutor General's Office, the Transport and Justice Ministries
underlined in their statements that the region had passed the legislation
within the scope of its authority.
There are no reasons to call the law unconstitutional. Taxi business
is regulated by regional acts not only in the Krasnodar territory, but
also in Moscow and the Orenburg and Tomsk regions, according to these
agencies.
The Constitutional Court is expected to announce its ruling by August
2010.
Meanwhile, the faction of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDPR) at the
State Duma on Wednesday brought forward a bill envisioning tough sanctions
against illegal cabbies and organizers of unsanctioned urban
transportation.
The bill was co-authored by LDPR faction leader Igor Lebedev and his
deputy Maxim Rokhmistrov.
The lawmakers said "the provision of unlicensed or unregistered
transport services for the population has become widespread in the country
and particularly in Moscow."
According to statistics, there are 10,000 taxi drivers in Moscow,
while another 40,000 work illegally.
"The illegal cabbies have no intention to pay taxes," the authors of
the bill said.
Some specialists estimate the taxi driving market's capacity at
100,000 billion roubles a year.
The LDPR said transport services are "controlled by criminal or
semi-criminal bodies who seek clients, protect illegal taxies, maintain
contacts with various agencies and draw considerable revenue from this
activity."
The bill suggests raising the fines for illegal taxi driving to at
least 5,000 roubles or administrative arrest for 10 days, with the
confiscation of revenue. The penalty may amount to a five-fold value of
the driver's earnings.
The legal entities may be fined 40,000 to 50,000 with the confiscation
of revenue.
The proposed fine for setting up an illegal company with three or more
vehicles for the transportation of more than eight passengers is 3,000 to
5,000 roubles for natural persons with the confiscation of vehicles, and
250,000 to 500,000 roubles for legal entities with the confiscation of
vehicles.
-0-myz