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To: Alex who wrote (28219)	2/14/1999 10:33:00 AM
From: goldsnow	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 116768

Business: The Economy Russian jobless figures 'to soar' The number of Russians out of work looks set to soar As Russia's economic crisis continues to worsen, Prime Minister Yevgeny Primakov has put a positive face on the prospect of agreeing a new loan with the International Monetary Fund (IMF). Evidence of the worsening crisis came in a government report that predicted unemployment would rise by 500,000 this year. The official number of jobless stood at 1.9m at the end of 1998, although government officials have admitted that the real figures is probably far higher. The government needs money to pay off its outstanding debts, but the IMF has been critical of the country's financial planning and wary of committing more money. "An IMF tranche in the amount of $4.3bn is very important to us for refinancing our debt," said Mr Primakov. The IMF as good as scrapped a $22.6bn aid package for Russia after the country's currency, the rouble, collapsed in August along with financial markets. The government also defaulted on some of its debt. An IMF mission to Russia last week made little progress towards a new loan agreement. Mr Primakov said he was doing his "best to meet the IMF half-way when possible, and when we consider it advisable." Banks in spotlight Mr Primakov said his government was paying more attention to the banking industry, especially since the Russian government began transferring its budget funds to state-controlled banks. Russian banks were shaken last week by accusations that the Central Bank had put the nation's hard-currency reserves in a virtually unknown offshore firm and reaped lucrative profits. Former Finance Minister Boris Fyodorov accused the Central Bank of corruption. According to the Moscow Times newspaper, Mr Fyodorov said the company was set up by Viktor Gerashchenko, who headed the Central Bank from 1992 to 1994 and was appointed to the job again last autumn. Former prosecutor general Yuri Skuratov said the company had startup capital of just $1,000 when it began working with the Central Bank in 1993, but by 1998, it had managed $50bn of Russia's foreign currency reserves and credits from the International Monetary Fund. Mr Skuratov, who resigned a day after submitting the report, has accused the Central Bank of being responsible for Russia's financial collapse last August. Former Central Bank Chairman Sergei Dubinin described the accusations as "irresponsible" and said the bank had used the offshore company as a necessary means of protecting Russia's reserves. He said no more than $1.4bn had been put into the fund in a year. news.bbc.co.uk