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MOSCOW: A court declared oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky guilty of an array of charges Tuesday including fraud and tax evasion, and sentenced him to nine years in prison minus time served. The declaration of guilt and sentence came in the 12th day of the laborious verdict-reading process in the most closely watched trial of post-Soviet Russia, and one that has been widely criticized as politically motivated. Khodorkovsky, the former head of the Yukos oil company and once estimated to be Russia's richest man, has already spent 583 days in jail, meaning he would serve about another seven and a half...

Speaking outside the courtroom, lawyer Konstantin Rifkin repeated the defense team's complaint that the judges had largely ignored the evidence it presented. "The evidence of witnesses is cited very selectively -- what fits with what the prosecution is saying goes into the verdict while there is complete silence on explanations or conclusions that favor our clients," Rifkin said. Judges read the verdict in oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky's politically charged trial for a ninth day Thursday, going over details of tax evasion charges. Defense lawyers agree that what the judges have read so far guarantees that the court will find their...

Yukos verdict drags into Thursday The trial of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, once the richest man in Russia and the former boss of oil company Yukos, has been adjourned until Thursday. Earlier, Russian judges read aloud their lengthy ruling in the trial for tax evasion and fraud. A final verdict on the seven counts may come on Thursday but observers say the hearing is likely to drag on for days. Emotions have been running high as one defence lawyer called the trial an "act of reprisal". There have been daily protests outside the court. Stacked odds Mr Khodorkovsky is widely predicted to...

Moscow, 17 May 2005 (RFE/RL) -- A Moscow court today found jailed former Yukos boss Mikhail Khodorkovskii guilty of most of the fraud, tax evasion, and embezzlement charges against him, RFE/RL's Russian Service reported, citing Interfax. The court reportedly has yet to read out its decision on one last charge before it can pronounce a final verdict against Khodorkovskii and his co-defendant, former top Yukos executive Platon Lebedev. It must also read summations of witness testimony. Russian authorities accuse Khodorkovskii and Lebedev of massive tax evasion, illegal privatization, and embezzlement. The prosecution has requested that the oil tycoon get the...

MOSCOW - It had the beginnings of a classic courtroom drama: Russian special forces storming the private jet of one of the wealthiest and most powerful men in the country; an 800-page indictment outlining charges of massive tax evasion and fraud; allegations of political persecution ordered from the highest reaches of the Kremlin. But as the trial of the Russian oil magnate Mikhail Khodorkovsky crept forward over the last 10 months, it became clear his story was lacking the most important element of any drama: suspense. When the trial's judge, Irina Kolesnikova, hands down her verdict on Wednesday, no one,...

Mikhail Khodorkovsky (TRJ) E-Mail this article Comments to Editor Discussion Forum Printer-Friendly Advertisement The spectacle of the trial of two of Russia’s richest men has now begun in Moscow. The charges against Platon Lebedev and Mikhail Khodorkovsky are serious, laboriously documented and damning. The clumsiness of the Russian prosecutorial, judicial and prison system notwithstanding, the way in which the charges, evidence, and defence testinomy are handled by the court will have long standing ramifications. The Russian and world media, human rights groups, think tanks, foreign embassies, investment institutions, banks with loan exposure to Russia, share-buyers and speculators are all watching...

In an impassioned and at times emotional appeal, Mikhail Khodorkovsky on Monday closed his defense with a 39-minute address to the court that left his relatives, lawyers and even reporters applauding and some supporters wiping away tears. The verdict for Khodorkovsky and his business partner Platon Lebedev is to be delivered at noon on April 27, Judge Irina Kolesnikova said after Khodorkovsky's speech was over. Both men face up to 10 years in prison, the maximum sentence demanded by prosecutors on charges of fraud, embezzlement and tax evasion. Addressing the court from the defendants' cage he has shared for the...

MOSCOW, March 30 (RIA Novosti) - According to the sentence of the Moscow City Court, Pichugin will serve his sentence in a maximum-security prison. Another defendant in the case, Alexei Peshkun, has been sentenced to four years, and he will also serve this sentence in a maximum-security prison. The judge passed the sentence on the basis of the jurors' verdict. Since the trial was held behind the closed doors, the judge announced only the resulting part of the sentence. "The court bases its sentence on the accusatory verdict of the jurors and has found him guilty of murders and attempted...

Sergei Mironov, speaker of the Russian upper house, was talking recently about the "real threat of a fascist putsch in Russia" -- "a new fuhrer with fascist-type, nationalist ideology" emerging in the 2008 presidential campaign. But while it would seem that so grave a danger calls for urgent and resolute action, Mironov sounded vague and nerveless about what should be done. Perhaps, he mused, the looming threat would simply impel the Russian people to ask President Vladimir Putin "to stay, not to leave" in 2008, when his constitutional term expires. The idea that the Kremlin might use the risk of...

Russia will continue to use legal measures to stamp out tax evasion, despite cases like the Yukos trial hurting the country’s image, presidential aide Igor Shuvalov announced Tuesday at an annual investment conference of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in Moscow, Reuters reports. “No one wants to repeat the Yukos thing again, but…such measures will continue to be used when it comes to taxes,” he said. “Everyone has to pay taxes. Even if it were not Yukos itself, there would have been some other company that would have had to answer for tax evasion.”

Yukos Exile Nevzlin Accuses Putin of Stalinism MosNews The situation in Russia today can be described as Stalinism, Leonid Nevzlin, a core Yukos shareholder and a longtime business associate of Russian oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky, told the New York Times on Sunday. The longtime business associate of the imprisoned oil tycoon spoke out from self-imposed exile in Israel, denying criminal charges by the Russian authorities and saying the accusations against him are a continuation of a Kremlin campaign of intimidation. “The situation in Russia today I would describe as Stalinism,” Leonid Nevzlin said in a interview at his home in...

MOSCOW, March 14. (RIA Novosti)-At the end of last week, Spanish police identified the biggest financial fraud in the country's history: 41 people suspected of laundering €250 million were arrested. They included Russians and Ukrainians. The main company involved in this case is Yukos, Finansoviye Izvestia writes. The money earmarked for laundering was first sent to a Dutch firm, then to an account held by Del Valle Abogados, a law firm based in Marbella. "The Yukos money was evidently laundered in Spain and put into real estate on the Costa del Sol. This Yukos money was illegally changed into investment...

Yukos caught up in Spain money-laundering case By Mark Mulligan in Madrid Published: March 14 2005 02:00 | Last updated: March 14 2005 02:00 Yukos, the Russian oil company, has been caught up in what Spanish authorities call Europe's largest money-laundering case, uncovered in weekend raids on the country's Costa del Sol. Spain's interior ministry yesterday alleged that funds illegally siphoned from Yukos, which has been hit by a $28bn (£15bn, €21bn) claim for back taxes by the Russian authorities, had been discovered on the Mediterranean coast as part of a broader money-laundering investigation. It said political and judicial authorities...

Spain 'cracks $300m money racket' It was Spain's biggest investigation Police in Spain say they have smashed a massive international money-laundering ring centred on the southern coastal resort of Marbella.Forty-one people of at least five nationalities were arrested. The group is suspected of laundering more than $300m (£155m) for gangs involved in murder, drug trafficking, arms dealing and prostitution. Spanish authorities said they suspected some of the cash was illegally siphoned from Russian oil company Yukos. A spokesman for Yukos has denied any involvement in money-laundering. Yukos defiant A boat, two planes and more than 40 luxury cars were...

Opponents of Russian President Vladimir Putin are calling for an investigation into his links with a German banker who was exposed last week as a former East German spy. Documents uncovered in a Berlin archive revealed Matthias Warnig, 49, who played a leading role in the controversial forced sell-off of part of the Yukos oil giant, was once an agent of the East German secret police, the Stasi. Yukos' Siberian unit was sold at rock-bottom prices According to research by The Wall Street Journal, Warnig - now the head of the Russian division of Germany's Dresdner Bank - cooperated with...

U.S. President George Bush yesterday hosted at the White House two Israeli-Russian businessmen involved in the Yukos oil major who are wanted by Moscow for alleged tax offenses. Mikhail Brudno and Vladimir Dubov, both shareholders in the giant Russian oil enterprise Yukos, were invited to a White House breakfast as guests of Congressmen Tom Lantos and Christopher Cox, Israel’s Haaretz daily reported. But U.S. Ambassador to Russia Alexander Vershbow said that Brudno and Dubov are staying in the United States legally and cannot be arrested. “They are both, as I understand it, dual citizens of Israel and Russia, and they...

China Loans Russia $6 Bln for Yukos Deal Tue Feb 1,11:46 AM ET - Reuters By Darya Korsunskaya and Mikhail Yenukov MOSCOW (Reuters) - China lent Russia $6 billion to help the Kremlin renationalize the key unit of oil major YUKOS, officials said on Tuesday, underpinning oil-hungry Beijing's efforts to tap into Russia's huge energy business. China, the world's No. 2 oil consumer, is scrambling to satisfy surging oil demand by picking up assets that are politically or commercially untenable for Western majors in places such as Iran or Russia - the world's No.2 oil exporter. Yugansk was put up...

Aristotle warned some bravado boys during his age “not to make any threats just because you have to.” It is stupid, perhaps suicidal, to posture aggressively, threatening sleeping powers that mean no harm, just because of a thorn up one rich macho boy’s backside. The U.S. lawyers hired by Russian banking and finance group Menatep and former owners and managers of Yukos oil company, who have immeasurable assets in Western vaults, acting on behalf of the Russian bravado boy Mikhail Khodorkovsky -- now in Moscow’s Matrosskaya Tishina prison on charges of fraud, forgery, tax evasion and worse -- are threatening...

Yukos oil supplies "have been suspended" From Poland A.M. Russian oil giant Yukos, whose main oil fields have just been renationalized, is cutting off its supplies to Central Europe, including Poland and Hungary. "Supplies have been suspended," Grupa Lotos spokesman Marcin Zachowicz told Gazeta Wyborcza. PKN Orlen declined to comment on the situation. "We had to suspend the fulfillment of several key contracts for oil exports. Over the past two days, we have informed our clients that we are forced to do so due to a 'force majeure'," said John Lush, general director of Petroval, Yukos' export arm. He added,...

It is difficult not to feel sympathy for a man confined to Russia's grim prison system, yet the letter by Mikhail Khodorkovsky printed by Vedomosit and The Moscow Times in December as neither a plea for leniency nor an acknowledgement of past errors. Instead, Khodorkovsky's letter constitutes a broad-brush condemnation of the political direction of Russia, by implication justifying the disastrous abuses of and by the Russian state during the late Yeltsin years when Khodorkovsky and his ilk held absolute power. Memories can be short, and a reply is called for. Khodorkovsky rails against the rapacious bureaucracy, predicting that the...