Posts Tagged ‘khodorkovsky’
Medvedev: Russia is “very poor” investment climate
President Dmitry Medvedev said Russia’s investment climate is “very bad”. In the crisis year of 2009 the flow of foreign direct investments in the Russian economy fell by almost half compared with the previous one.
“An important theme is the investment climate, these must be dealt with in the first place” – the president said, speaking Wednesday at a meeting to establish an international financial center in Moscow.
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Khodorkovsky verdict sheds light on justice system
Russians begin to take notice as oil tycoon is again found guilty. Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the jailed oil tycoon turned liberal martyr, was found guilty today of a second set of charges in a trial held up as a symbol of Russia’s compromised justice system.
The guilty verdict was widely expected but nonetheless provoked harsh condemnation from Russia’s marginalized opposition, international observers and Khodorkovsky’s family.
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“A thief should sit in jail…”
The conviction of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, a former Russian oil tycoon, is a sobering reminder that the Russia of Vladimir Putin is surely a throwback to the bad old days of the totalitarian state. Mr Khodorkovsky has already spent the past seven years in prison for tax evasion and money-laundering; after the new trial (a travesty of justice that has led to public criticism from Hillary Clinton and the EU) more years in prison seem inevitable—enough to keep him in custody well after Russia’s next presidential election, due in 2012.
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Russia acknowledges it has an image problem
Russia has an image problem due to cases such as the death in jail of a whistleblower and the trials of an ex-tycoon, a senior official has said.
But the president’s chief economic adviser added that Russia was working hard to improve the investment climate. “We are doing our best to punish those people who are not following the rule of law,” said Arkady Dvorkovich.
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The Concealed Battle to Run Russia
The New York Review of Books
by Amy Knight
Despite their professed mutual respect, Russia’s president, Dmitry Medvedev, and his prime minister, Vladimir Putin, apparently cannot agree on one question—which of them will be running for the Russian presidency in March 2012. Over a year ago Putin told foreign journalists that he and Medvedev would at some point “sit down and come to an agreement” about who would be the presidential nominee of United Russia, the overwhelmingly pro-Kremlin party, in the next election. (He repeated the same promise in a recent interview with Larry King on CNN.) But that moment has yet to come, and in the meantime, both men are provoking speculation about their possible candidacies.
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Legal proceedings test whether Russia will move closer to West
Two separate legal proceedings this week are freighted with significance for Russia, helping determine whether the country will move closer to the West or remain an arm’s-length acquaintance, widely regarded with suspicion.
The second trial of former oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky resumes in Moscow on Wednesday, with the judge expected to begin rendering his verdict, a process that could take days. And Thursday, the European Parliament is scheduled to vote on a proposal to ban visas and seize assets of Russian officials linked to the death in custody of Sergei Magnitsky, a lawyer who was arrested after uncovering a $230 million fraud scheme.
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Plea for end to Khodorkovsky ‘persecution’
A group of western politicians has urged Dmitry Medvedev, Russian president, to “end the persecution” of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the jailed Yukos oil tycoon, just days before a Moscow judge begins reading the verdict in his second trial.
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Text of letter to President Medvedev
His Excellency Dmitry Medvedev
President of the Russian Federation
Dear Mr. President
We, the undersigned, believe that Russia can and should be a positive force in shaping the development of our increasingly interconnected world. As a major global power, a bridge between East and West and a country with a long and proud history in virtually every field of human endeavour, Russia can exert tremendous positive influence on the world of tomorrow.
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Be critical, not hypocritical – Western leaders should be much readier to criticise Russia
After more than a decade with Vladimir Putin in charge, few can be sanguine about Russia’s direction. Its democracy is a sham. Strong growth may have raised living standards, but its dependence on oil and gas exports often makes its economy resemble that of the Soviet Union. Corruption has become so pervasive that it undermines even the functioning of the state. Above all, the rule of law is absent, as will be seen again on December 15th when a Russian judge is expected to sentence Mikhail Khodorkovsky to another term in prison. The true crime of Mr Khodorkovsky, an unlovely oil oligarch who fell out with Mr Putin in 2003, is that his present jail term is about to expire.
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