OREANDA-NEWS. On May 16, 2007 “COMSTAR - United TeleSystems” JSC (“Comstar UTS”) (LSE: CMST), announced that its regular meeting of the Board of Directors, which was held on May 16, 2007, accepted the resignation of Eric Franke as President and Chief Executive Officer of the Company, reported the press-centre of  “Comstar UTS”.

The Board of Directors satisfied Mr. Franke’s request to be released from his employment contract with Comstar UTS in order to take up a position with another business. The Board of Directors has appointed Nikolay Tokarev as interim President and CEO of Comstar-UTS with immediate effect. Mr Tokarev will hold this position until a permanent President and CEO is appointed.


Sergei Shchebetov, Chairman of the Board of Directors of Comstar UTS, commented: “Eric Franke has implemented several large scale projects during his time at Comstar. He created the corporate centre, built a strong operational management team, started the legal merger of a number of our operating companies and launched a cost optimization programme. Mr. Franke was very successful in establishing effective relations with the international investment community. We want to thank Eric for his contribution to the development of Comstar UTS”.