I notice that the article says that the "Weapons of mass destruction" will be checked against a Russian "list" and the American "data". I guess they are by stepping the UN in the inspection process. A great diplomatic coup in itself on the Russians part if this gains any momentum. I also notice the article does not mention who will be involved in setting up the interim Government. Interim Governments always favor the Governments who help set up the interim Governments. What the short term effects of this will be if it gains diplomatic momentum over the next few days I do not know.
Medium to long term I think that Moscow and Washington are at direct odds with each other and Moscow would love nothing better than to get their fingers deeper into this situation and lengthen the conflict with Iraq as much as possible. Or cause the U.S. to decide not to go through with the War under terms favorable to the Russians. I think Bush will do his best to ignore this as he did the huge world wide protests. If Bush cannot shrug this off I think it is going to be bad news for the economy the stock market and the dollar long term. Then again so will the war itself.