Putin to chair Vnesheconombank supervisory board meeting

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MOSCOW, February 22 (Itar-Tass) -- Russian Prime Minister Vladimir
Putin will chair a meeting of the Vnesheconombank (VEB) Supervisory Board
on Tuesday.
The meeting will focus on the bank's draft budget for 2011. The
combined portfolio of loans to non-lending organizations is expected to
reach 454.1 billion roubles (up by 105.1 billion roubles). The
balance-sheet profit is to be 31 billion roubles.
The Supervisory Board will also discuss governmental support to
shipbuilding enterprises, including through guarantees of repayment to
customers who have placed orders at Russian shipyards, which currently do
not have sufficient financial resources for such guarantees.
The board will also consider the bank's plans to acquire bonds of the
United Aircraft Corporation (UAC).
The agenda also includes VEB's participation in the financing of
Moscow development plans through public-private partnership up to 900
million roubles.
The board will also discuss updated parameters of the bank's
participation in the financing of the construction of an ammonia, methanol
and carbamide plant in Mendeleyevsk, Tatarstan.

.Russian planes ready to take off to evacuate Russians from Libya.

MOSCOW, February 22 (Itar-Tass) -- Russia's Emergencies Ministry is
preparing its planes for evacuation of Russian citizens from the
violence-stricken Libya, a ministry source told Itar-Tass.
On Fenbuary 20, anti-government riots spread to the country's capital
city, Tripoli. Contradictory reports are coming from here about the number
of vicitims. Thus, official Libyan sources speak of 84 people killed,
while the opposition says the clashes have claimed several hundred human
lives and left about a thousand injured.
"The president has ordered to elaborate a plan of evacuation of
Russian citizens from Libya. Four Emergencies Ministry's aircraft,
including an Ilyushin-62, a Yakovlev-42, and two Ilyushin-76 planes are
ready to take off. Two more planes, an Ilyushin-76 and a Yakovlev-42, are
on the standby," said Irina Andrianova, a ministry spokeswoman.
"We hope four planes will be able to leave for Libya in the morning of
Tuesday, February 22," she said. "The Ilyushin-62 will be the first one to
take off. The early data we have indicates there are about 500 Russian
citizens to be evacuated."
President Dmitry Medvedev's press secretary Natalya Timakova said
earlier the President had issued and instruction to the Emergencies
Minister Sergei Shoigu and the president of the Russian state railway
corporation RZD, Vladimir Yakunin, to draft plans for a possible
evacuation of the Russian nationals stranded in Libya.

.Belarus, Cuba to discuss bilateral cooperation.

MINSK, February 22 (Itar-Tass) -- Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno
Rodriguez arrives in the Belarusian capital on Tuesday to discuss the
current state and prospects for further development of bilateral relations.
Rodriguez' program includes a meeting with Belarusian President
Alexander Lukashenko, and talks with speaker of Belarus' House of
Representatives Vladimir Andreichenko and Foreign Minister Sergei
Martynov. The talks are expected to focus on boosting political contacts,
and further steps to promote interparliamentary cooperation, and to
encourage trade and economic ties.
Cuba and Belarus are closely cooperating within the United Nations and
the Non-Aligned Movement, but their trade and economic relations leaves
much to be desired. According to the Belarusian Foreign Ministry, the peak
development of economic cooperation between the two countries was reported
in 2008, when their trade turnover reached 49.7 million U.S. dollars and
Belarusian exports exceeded 35 million U.S. dollars. Following a global
economic recession, the trade turnover between Belarus and Cuba dropped to
7.4 million U.S. dollars in 2010, when Belarus' exports were 6.9 million
U.S. dollars.
Belarusian exports include primarily spare car parts, trucks,
tractors, and tyres.

.Moderate earthquake hits Australia.

VLADIVOSTOK, February 22 (Itar-Tass) -- A magnitude 5 earthquake
rocked Australia early on Saturday, the Russian Academy of Sciences'
Geophysical service reports.
According to the service, the earth tremors were registered at a depth
of 10 kilometers.
The service cited U.S. seismologists, who said the quake's epicentre
was located 334 kilometers to the north-east of the city of Alice Springs
populated by 26,000 people. There were no reports about casualties or
damages.
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