Russian radio reports latest rumours about Putin succession plan.

(From BBC Monitoring International Reports)

Excerpt from report by Russian Ekho Moskvy radio on 1 September

[Presenter] A plan to present St Petersburg Governor Valentina Matviyenko as a potential president is being considered at very high level, the Novyye Izvestiya newspaper reported today. The head of the Centre for Political Information, Aleksey Mukhin, told our radio station that the plan already has a codename - Valentina the Great.

[Mukhin] The rumour is doing the rounds in the towers and corridors of the Kremlin, from various directions. Matviyenko's associates like the idea and they're doing all they can to fan the rumour. And eventually a …