Moscow, March 11, 2008. COMSTAR – United TeleSystems OJSC (COMSTAR-OTS, LSE: CMST), the largest operator of integrated telecommunication services in Russia and CIS announces that Roman Akatov is appointed Commercial Director of COMSTAR-UTS OJSC.

Earlier, R. Akatov was holding an office of Deputy Director General for Commerce at Russian Telecommunication Network OJSC (ROSNET).

"As Commercial Director of COMSTAR-UTS, Roman Akatov will be responsible for developing all COMSTAR commercial activities in the Moscow corporate communication market, including interaction with major customers”, HR director of COMSTAR – United TeleSystems OJSC, Dmitry Karmanov said. "The Moscow corporate market is viewed by the Company to be an important line of the business, and we count on our business to grow, in particular through new personnel appointments. I am sure that the knowledge Roman Akatov has gained of the capital-city communication market and his professional experience will enable him to achieve significant results in promotion of COMSTAR-UTS services in Moscow".

Roman Akatov entered upon his duties on March 11.

He is the successor in office of Leonid Gushturov.

Roman Akatov was born in 1973. He received his first higher education at the N.E. Bauman Moscow State Technical University, having graduated from it in 1996, and his second Master degree was at the Russian Distant Learning Institute of Finance and Economics, in 1997. Presently, he is an Executive MBA Program student at the Institute of Business and Business Administration under the Academy of National Economy of the Russian Federation. He started working in the communication market from 1995, as a staff member of the Moscow Telecommunication Corporation (COMCOR); then, he was employed by Aerocom CJSC. In 2001, he joined ROSNET where was holding positions from the Director of Service Sale Department to the Commercial Director to the Deputy Director General for Commerce.