Afanasiev told reporters on the sidelines of the Moscow Exchange annual forum that the bourse's plan to open access to foreign stocks was not connected with sanctions against Russia.

Reuters reported last week that the Moscow Stock Exchange was discussing giving brokers by the end of this year remote access to shares in 50 Western companies trading on other exchanges.

(Reporting by Elena Fabrichnaya; Writing by Andrey Ostroukh)

Stocks treated in this article : RUSLAND-RTS, Moskovskaya Birzha MMVB-RTS PAO