Gazprom may limit Belarus supplies if debt remains - Miller.

MOSCOW, June 20 (Itar-Tass) -- Russia's Gazprom may limit its supplies
to Belarus if it does not settle the debt within five days, the company's
CEO Alexei Miller said.
"If the overdue payment is not settled within five days, Gazprom has
every right, according to the contract, to limit the supplies of gas
proportionally to the debt," he said. "We may reduce the supplies to 85
percent a day."
Belarus "sent to us suggestions on a settlement by means of materials
and equipment," Miller said in an interview to the Russia-24 TV channel.
"This proves that our counterparts in Belarus confirm the debt."
He also mentioned that the talks with Belarus' Minister of Energy,
Alexander Ozerets, /on June 19/ "did not bring any results."
Belarus owes to Gazprom 200 million dollars.
On Friday, Gazprom's spokesman Sergei Kupriyanov said the company
might limit its supplies by 85 percent from 10 a.m. on Monday. As he said,
the decision had been made on June 18.
"This may require certain technical work from our side," Kupriyanov
said and explained that Gazprom would provide "export supplies like
earlier."


.Chechnya's Grozny-Avia launches flight to Istanbul

GROZNY, June 20 (Itar-Tass) -- Chechnya's Grozny-Avia Company launches
a new route to connect the capital of the republic with Istanbul. The
first direct flight is due on June 20, the director general of the
company, Alik Zulgayev, said on Saturday.
"On June 25, we shall open a route to Turkey's another city -
Antalya," he said. "We shall take 100 passengers on board at a time."
A crew from Grozny will service the flights.
"We have three crews which may fly abroad, and all of them have
necessary certificates."
At first, the company will fly to Turkey twice a week by its two
Yak-42 jets and additional two rented ones.
Grozny's airport is ready to operate international flights, the
director general of the state company Vainakh-Avia, Sultan Gambulatov,
said.
"We plan to start with a route to Turkey, we have all necessary
agreements," he said.
Later on, Grozny's companies will take passengers to the Arab
Emirates, Ukraine, Kazakhstan and China.
Vainakh-Avia may book hotels in Turkey for its clients.
About 35 percent of air passengers going abroad from the North
Caucasus' Mineralny Vody, Makhachkala or North Ossetia come from Chechnya,
Gambulatov said. Many residents of Chechnya and neighbouring regions will
enjoy the new routes, he added.
Chechnya's Vainakh-Avia plans to open summer flights to Sochi for
those planning to spend holidays at the Black Sea.
"On Fridays a plane goes to Sochi, and on Sundays it takes passengers
back," Gambulatov said. "We receive many calls from those who ask us to
start these flights."
The air fare to Sochi will be around 4,000 roubles.
The demand for flights from Grozny's airport is growing, and the
company plans to expand the geography of its routes. The highest demand is
for flights to Moscow, which are operated twice a day four days a week, he
said.


.Gazprom may redirect gas to Europe avoiding Belarus.

ST. PETERSBURG, June 20 (Itar-Tass) -- Russia's Gazprom has technical
opportunities to redirect the flows of gas supplies to Europe via Ukraine,
should there be any problems with Belarus, the company's CEO Alexei Miller
said.
"We may use the pipelines that cross Ukraine and Poland," he said.
The company is not using 100 percent of the transit capacities, as the
demand in Southern Europe is lower now due to the summer period, he
explained.
"We should be very accurate /about possible changes/," he added.


.By 2020 India, China to become world economic centres - view.

ST. PERERSBURG, June 20 (Itar-Tass) -- By 2020, India and China will
become the world's economic centres, and the global monetary system will
have to change, an economist and the author of the term BRIC /Brazil,
Russia, India, China/, Jim O'Neil, said at a BRIC session of the St.
Petersburg International Economic Forum.
The world monetary system will have to adapt to the changes in the
world's economic system which will make India and China global centres, he
said.
China already now shows enormous growth.
"It is not clear as yet whether some united currency will appear or if
the role of the Special Drawing Rights /SDR/ will change," O'Neil said.
The latter may mean a reform of the International Monetary Fund, a US'
instrument, he added
In any case, the role of the BRIC member-countries' currencies will
grow, O'Neil said.

-0-kar