MOSCOW, Feb. 18 (UPI) -- Russia will launch a major review of its vast, three-decade-old economic privatization program, the head of the Russian Audit Authority said.
The Russian government is going to launch the review of the workings of the privatization program that followed the collapse of communism, Audit Authority chief Sergei Stepashin told the official the Novosti news agency.
The 1990s privatization program under former President Boris Yeltsin was extremely controversial because it allowed much, if not most of the country's wealth, to be concentrated in the hands of a few multi-billionaire oligarchs.
Stepahsin said his investigators would look into the privatization process and primarily concentrate on blatant violations, Novosti said. The Authority is to report its conclusions to President Vladimir Putin.
