MOSCOW, February 14 (AVN) - The State Duma lower house of parliament on Wednesday sent a parliamentary inquiry to Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov asking to him to comment on the efficiency of auctioning off the Defence Ministry's military compounds vacated in the course of the military reform.
As many as 1,509 compounds with the depreciable value of RUR28.83bn (USD1bn) were vacated from January 1, 1997 to June 1999, the inquiry says. However their sale is severely hampered by insufficient protection. As a result, almost half of military installations prepared for sale in 1998 had to be bought in. Lawmakers believe some of the compounds may be damaged too much and not sold at all.
The Duma urged Kasyanov to assess poor sales of compounds and brief the house on the government's attitude towards gratuitous transfer of compounds to Russian regions and municipal administrations so that they would be transferred into social infrastructure installations, such as orphan homes, etc.