Moscow and New York (June 1, 2006) - Open Joint Stock Company “Vimpel-Communications” (“VimpelCom” or the “Company”) (NYSE: VIP)today announced that it has withdrawn its proposal to both Telenor ASA ("Telenor") and Altimo (the telecom subsidiary of Alfa Group) to acquire 100% of CJSC "Kyivstar G.S.M." ("Kyivstar") for US$5 billion. Telenor has publicly stated that a market-based separation agreement between Telenor and Altimo and the associated Federal Anti-Monopoly Service (FAS) approvals are necessary conditions to the sale of Kyivstar to VimpelCom. However, VimpelCom sees little prospect that such an agreement will be reached in the foreseeable future.

Alexander Izosimov, VimpelCom's Chief Executive Officer, said, "We regrettably had to withdraw today our offer to buy Kyivstar. Although the principal terms of the acquisition have largely been agreed between all three parties, the acquisition of Kyivstar has been linked to the market-based separation agreement and we see very little progress that has been made between Telenor and Altimo on this issue over the past three months. Hence, we see little value in allowing negotiations to continue any longer. We will always be happy to return to the negotiating table and to consider further proposals from Telenor and Altimo in the future. In the meantime, we will focus all our efforts on pursuing our announced strategy of expansion into the Ukrainian market through CJSC “Ukrainian Radio Systems”, where the initial results following our launch of the “Beeline” brand have been encouraging".

VimpelCom is a leading international provider of mobile telecommunications services in Russia and Kazakhstan, with newly acquired operations in Ukraine, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. The VimpelCom Group's license portfolio covers approximately 232 million people. Geographically it covers 78 regions in Russia (with 136.5 million people, representing 94% of Russia's population) as well as the entire territories of Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. VimpelCom was the first Russian company to list its shares on the New York Stock Exchange ("NYSE"). VimpelCom's ADSs are listed on the NYSE under the symbol "VIP".