MOSCOW, August 21, 2007 Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VCIOM) presents information concerning how the Russians treat Great Britain's recommendations to introduce changes into the Constitution of the Russian Federation, allowing to extradite Russian citizens to the tribunal of other states; whether the respondents consider it necessary, to give out A.Lugovoy to Great Britain.

The majority of respondents (62% against 20%) assume that Russia should not introduce changes to the Constitution allowing to extradite our fellow citizens, suspected of having committed a crime on the territory of other countries to the tribunals of these foreign states. This point of view is shared by the majority of representatives of all generations of Russians (60-64%).

Two thirds of respondents (63%) characterize the recommendation of Great Britain concerning the introduction of changes to our constitution as inadmissible intrusion into the internal affairs of the Russian Federation. Three times as few respondents (23%) treat this recommendation as an understandable wish of another state to accomplish the investigation of a crime, which occurred on its territory. Britain's recommendations find more understanding (31%) in medium-size Russian cities than in small cities and villages (23%-25%) and, even less, so in Moscow, Saint Petersburg and other big cities (13%-14%).

When the discussion comes to the specific case - the extradition of A.Lugovoy, suspected by British authorities of A.Litvinenko's murder, to Great Britain, no more than 10% of Russians speak in favour of his extradition. 7% of them assume that this must be made so that justice be done, and 3% - in order to maintain good relations with the Western countries.

74% of respondents are against giving A.Lugovoy out, 47% among them argue that this contradicts our Constitution, and 27% mention that Lugovoy's fault has not been proven yet, but they can easily "write him off" in England. Statements regarding the need to abide by the constitution are especially characteristic of the respondents with higher and uncompleted higher education (58%; cf.: 43%-46% in the group with secondary or post-secondary education and 33% in the group of respondents with elementary education).

The All-Russia opinion poll was conducted by VCIOM on July 28-29, 2007. 1600 respondents were interviewed in 153 population areas of 46 regions of Russia. The statistical error does not exceed 3.4%.