Acting Russian President Vladimir Putin named several new senior officials to the Kremlin staff Tuesday.

Igor Shchogolev was appointed head of the presidential press service, Putin's new spokesman Alexei Gromov said.

Before this appointment, Shchogolev worked in charge of liaising with the media at the government executive office. Previously, he was a professional journalist at the Russian state

news agency Itar-Tass.

Career diplomat Alexei Gromov was named Putin's press secretary. Born in 1960, Gromov served on the staff of the Soviet and Russian foreign ministries between 1982 and 1996, worked in Karlovy Vary, Prague and Bratislava and held a post in the foreign minister's secretariat.

From 1996 to 1999, he headed the Russian presidential press service.

Vladimir Rakhmanin, chief of the Foreign Ministry's Information and Press Department and spokesman for the ministry as of Tuesday, was appointed chief of presidential protocol.

Meanwhile, Putin dismissed three senior Kremlin officials.

Andrei Shtorkh was fired as a senior presidential aide, Boris Nimts as head of the local self-government department of the president's executive office and Vyacheslav Vasyagin as chief of the executive office management department.

Vasyagin was replaced by Alexander Strelkov, Gromov said.