IMF resumes loan payments to Russia

The International Monetary Fund has approved the release of another instalment of its ten-billion-dollar loan to Russia.

An IMF spokesman said seven hundredmillion dollars would be made available.

Payments of the loan were postponed last year because of concerns about Russia's poor tax collection record, but the IMF announced last month that the situation had improved enough to allow a resumption of payments.

The Russian Finance Minister, Mikhail Zadarnov, welcomed the decision, adding that the money would be used to finance the most urgent budget needs.

Preliminary figures released by the government suggest that last year Russia's economy grew for the first time since the break-up of the Soviet Union.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service