Former Russian PM dies - report

MOSCOW - Russian state news agency RIA Novosti is reporting that former Prime Minister Viktor Chernomyrdin, who held the post in the turbulent 1990s as Russia was throwing off communism and developing into a market economy, has died at age 72.

The agency, citing sources close to Chernomyrdin early Wednesday, gave no cause of death but said he had been ill.

Chernomyrdin served as the first head of the state gas monopoly Gazprom, from 1989 to 1992.

He joined the government in 1992, when then President Boris Yeltsin appointed him prime minister. He held the post until the financial crash of 1998, when Russia defaulted on its debts and devalued its currency.

After Vladimir Putin became president, he appointed Chernomyrdin as ambassador to Ukraine in 2001 and he remained in this post until last year.

-AP