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Developments in eastern Ukraine

Russian ruble approved as sole accounting currency in Donetsk republic

DPR's official said the share of the ruble in the budget of the Donetsk Republic currently stood at 92%, and of the Ukrainian hryvnia, at 8%

© AP Photo/Mstyslav Chernov

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Russian ruble takes up 85% of Luhansk Republic’s currency market — LPR head

MOSCOW, September 3. /TASS/. All prices, tariffs and budget payments in the self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic will be calculated in the Russian rubles, as follows from a resolution by the Cabinet of Ministers effective since September 1, Finance Minister Yekaterina Matyushchenko said on Wednesday.

"Under the resolution the Russian ruble was approved as the sole accounting currency," the Donetsk News Agency quotes Matyushchenko as saying. "The ruble is the sole mandatory currency used to calculate prices, tariffs and budget payments."

Matyushchenko said the share of the ruble in the budget of the Donetsk Republic currently stood at 92%, and of the Ukrainian hryvnia, at 8%.

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Prices, tariffs and budget payments will be carried out under a fixed rate, she added.

"In order to avoid price hikes a special fixed rate was set for recalculating prices, tariffs, budget payments, financial sanctions and fines and the rates of taxes and duties established before," Matyushchenko said.

Earlier, the Donetsk Republic’s Council of Ministers adopted a resolution to declare the Russian ruble as the sole accounting currency.

"The official rate of the ruble was set by the Central Bank against the US dollar, the euro and the Ukrainian hryvnia. The fixed exchange rate of the ruble against the hryvnia for currency exchange transactions will be canceled," Matyushchenko said in a statement.

Starting from today, the Donetsk News Agency says, the Donetsk Republic shifted from the fixed exchange rate of the ruble, set at 1:2, to the floating rate. On September 3, the Central Bank of the Donetsk Republic established the hryvnia’s exchange rate at 2.9932 rubles. The rate is mandatory for accounting and the calculation of customs and other payments by all economic entities of the Donetsk People’s Republic.

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Eastern Ukraine

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