Earlier this week the news was that Andersen Worldwide was in negotiations to merge the non-U.S. Andersen practices into KMPG.

Today's news is that Andersen Russia has reached an agreement to combine its operation with Ernst & Young, and Andersen's operations in Hong Kong and China have decided to join forces with PricewaterhouseCoopers.

The decision by Andersen Hong Kong and Andersen China came as a surprise after all of Andersen's Asia-Pacific affiliates had voted unanimously to support the KPMG combination. The Hong Kong and China operations decided to go their own way.

"While we remain deeply upset by the events affecting Andersen in the USA which have led to this development, we have no doubt that joining PricewaterhouseCoopers offers great opportunities and benefits for our firm, our people and -- above all -- our customers," said Albert Ng, Andersen's managing partner for Greater China. The combined firm will be identified only as PricewaterhouseCoopers.

Hans-Jochum Horn, head of Andersen's Russia and Commonwealth of Independent States practices, indicated he believes the decision to combine with Ernst & Young is "prudent." Mr. Horn will become managing partner of the new firm, which will identified only as Ernst & Young.