Washington, 30 April 1997 (RFE/RL) - Russia yesterday signed its agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) setting the 1997 targets for this year's drawings from its extended $10.1 billion loan.
An IMF spokeswoman says the agreement will go to the fund's Board of Executive Directors in mid-May for approval, with disbursements to begin within a week.
For this year, disbursements will be made on a quarterly basis after reviews, compared to the monthly basis used in the first year. The spokeswoman says the quarterly payments will be about $700 million each.
Sources at the World Bank, meantime, say the bank has a $600 million loan ready for Russia once the IMF loan program is approved. The sources say the bank loan will be used by Moscow to help implement further structural reforms in parallel with work being undertaken under the IMF program. The bank loan is scheduled to be taken up by the bank's Board June 5th.