Prime Minister Vladimir Putin expressed his condolences to the families of the victims of the terrorist attack in Vladikavkaz. He also said that during the Presidium meeting the decision on financial support for the victims and families of the deceased would be made.

In terms of wildfires in the Altai Region, the prime minister said that additional funds of 1.4 billion roubles would be allocated to support the region and the people affected by the wildfires as well as to rebuild and repair housing that was burnt down.

During the Government Presidium meeting, the draft concept for the National Accreditation System and the plan for implementing it were discussed. Vladimir Putin stressed that "administrative procedures have been cancelled where they are excessive," and that all supervisory procedures must become unbiased and impartial. According to Vladimir Putin, to reduce the risk of corruption in obtaining certificates for different products, a single body for accrediting the manufacturers should be established, and public organisations should be invited to take part in its work.

At the top of the meeting's agenda was the energy project being implemented jointly with Turkey - the construction of Turkey's first nuclear power station. The construction of the power station will bring guaranteed orders for dozens of Russian machine-building companies and will demonstrate how competitive the Russian nuclear power industry is.

Transcript of the beginning of the meeting:

Vladimir Putin: As you know, a terrorist attack took place today in Vladikavkaz; many people have been hurt, some killed.

I'd like to express my sincere condolences to the families of the dead and injured. I am confident that the law-enforcement agencies will do their best to find the perpetrators. Today we will take a decision on providing financial assistance for the injured and the families of those killed. I want the Ministry of Healthcare and Social Development to tell us what is being done to help these people. Please, go ahead.

Vladimir Belov (Deputy Minister of Healthcare and Social Development): Fourteen people were killed by the blast. As of 3 p.m., 87 people had been admitted to hospital in Vladikavkaz; four of them are children and two have grave head wounds. The doctors are currently discussing how many need to be moved to Moscow. The Healthcare Ministry and the Emergencies Ministry currently suggest 20 people should be moved. Ambulances are standing by. Hospital beds will be made available depending on the nature of their injuries. An Emergencies Ministry plane took off at 2:30 p.m. carrying doctors from both the Emergencies Ministry and the Healthcare Ministry. In addition, a telemedical system will be delivered to Vladikavkaz to deal with the exchange of information between Moscow and the Central Republican Hospital in North Ossetia. That is all for now.

Vladimir Putin: Do they have everything necessary to offer the victims prompt treatment?

Vladimir Belov: Yes, the Emergencies Ministry plane is delivering additional medicines and blood, but they so far have everything they need.

Vladimir Putin: Good. Thank you. Please keep me informed.

Let's now discuss items on the agenda. A decision has been taken to make additional compensation payments to people who lost the savings they had deposited with Sberbank during the Soviet period. Mr Kudrin (Alexei Kudrin, the Minister of Finance), please go ahead.

Alexei Kudrin: Mr Putin, ladies and gentlemen. The government continues to pay compensation to all those who had deposits with Sberbank before June 20, 1991.

Compensation has been paid annually since 1996, in stages and depending on age groups. We will continue such payments this year. The compensation we plan to pay to people born between 1967 and 1991 will be double the amount they had on their deposits. Compensation paid to people born before 1946 will be three times larger than their deposits.

This year an initial sum of 85 billion roubles will be allocated to cover these compensation payments. People were active in withdrawing the money, more active than before, as soon as they learned that this compensation is two or three times larger than their former deposits. As a result, the bulk of the funds allocated had already been used by the middle of the year. When reviewing the 2010 budget in summer, we approved the allocation of an additional 30 billion roubles [for this purpose].

We think that, at 115 billion roubles, the total sum to be paid in compensation this year will cover payments made through to the end of the year, including those cases, where depending on the age of the account-holder, the compensation paid is double or triple their original savings.

Vladimir Putin: Good. We also discussed the need to continue work on the housing and utilities sector. In the previous period we allocated over 247 billion roubles for it and more than 14 million people saw real improvement in their housing conditions as part of these programmes. Mr Kozak (Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Kozak) I'd like to hear more about this work in greater detail.

Dmitry Kozak: Mr Prime Minister, ladies and gentlemen. This figure - the 247.4 billion roubles transferred to the constituent entities of the Federation - is interesting above all because it exceeds Russia's contribution to the fund (the Housing and Utilities Fund) by 7.5 billion roubles. It ended up being larger because we deployed the unallocated, temporary surplus resources of the fund which today amount to 25 billion roubles. Thanks to our highly efficient system of deploying temporarily surplus funds the resources commanded by the fund grew to 25 billion roubles. All this money will be transferred to the constituent entities of the Federation towards their implementation of the fund's programmes to re-house people from dilapidated housing and doing capital repairs of the housing stock.

To be continued...