OREANDA-NEWS  On 28 October was announced, that the Russian Basketball Federation (RBF) and IES-Basket School Basketball League, founded and organized by IES-Holding, concluded 17 October a cooperation agreement. Its signing ceremony was attended by RBF President Sergey Chernov and IES-Holding CEO, President of IES-Basket League Mikhail Slobodin.

The RBF was among the first to support an initiative on establishing the School Basketball League and to express its intention to take an active part in its work in the future. IES-Basket League was set up in 2007 on the basis of the Perm School Basketball League with the support of IES-Holding and the Perm Territory Basketball Federation. Teams from 319 schools of the region took part in League's games of season 2007-2008, with the number of participants exceeding 8,000 people.

In the new, 2008-2009 season, the League will rise to the federal level with schoolchildren from other eleven regions of the Russian Federation joining it and the total number of participants growing up to 70,000 people. Each school taking part in the program will receive a set of balls from IES-Basket's organizers, while winners of the regional tournaments will get professional basketball outfits, in which they will continue vying for the champion's title.  

Winners of the IES-Basket School Basketball League will visit Berlin in May 2009 to watch games of the best European teams at Euroleague ULEB Final Four. Moreover, the winning team of the League's 2008/09 season will represent Russia in the School Team World Championship in Turkey next spring.

"The activities of IES-Basket are undoubtedly successful, and the League has a great potential for development and reaching the federal level. We hope that IES's teenager basketball support project will contribute to building up the health of Russian schoolchildren and promoting domestic sports", noted IES-Holding President Mikhail Slobodin. He also expressed special thanks for the support of the project to Grigory Rapota, Plenipotentiary Representative of the President of the Russian Federation in the Privolzhsky Federal District, Alexander Konovalov, Minister of Justice of the Russian Federation, President of the Higher School Basketball Association, Sergey Belov, an Olympic champion, repeated world and European champion, member of the Public Chamber of the Russian Federation, and Sergey Kuschenko, Head of the Central Army Sports Club, a Federal State Unitary Enterprise of the Defense Ministry of the Russian Federation. Those high-profile public figures are members of the IES-Basket League's Board of Guardians.