CHECHNYA, FEDERAL CENTER TO SIGN COMPETENCE DELINEATION TREATY, MAY NEXT?

MOSCOW, February 5 (RIA Novosti) - "We are anxious to be ready to sign the treaty before May next, and I think there is a chance to fulfil this desire," President Alu Alkhanov of Chechnya said to a news conference in Moscow. He was referring to an upcoming competence delineation treaty between Chechnya and the federal center.

A republican commission and another ad hoc body, under President Vladimir Putin's envoy plenipotentiary to federal district South, are working at a draft, he added.

The treaty will not grant Chechnya whatever extraordinary political status. All its premises will proceed from two essential instruments-the republican and the federal Constitutions," stressed Mr. Alkhanov.

Significantly, the Chechen top insists on several clauses to determine center-republic economic relations. The matter concerns taxation and certain privileges, added the President.

He strongly warned against a sensation certain media outlets are making of the prospective treaty. Chechnya passed its Constitution in a 2003 referendum, so to determine its economic, political and legal status. That is why the treaty is to keep within constitutional boundaries, he emphasized.