Word: putin
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...cares whether Nixon or Giscard ever smoked - or ever shared Brezhnev's company together? Their function in the tale was simply to underscore Russians' jaundiced view of their own rulers. I was reminded of this joke from my youth by the furor over President Putin's recent acquisition of a unique piece of jewelry. At the Russian president's reception for American tycoons, Robert Kraft, the owner of this year's Super Bowl Champions New England Patriots, showed Putin his 2005 Super Bowl ring. It's a 14-karat, four ounces white-gold piece, studded with 124 diamonds arranged...
Since President Vladimir Putin came to power, the Russian economy has staged a dramatic comeback after its near collapse in 1998. But along with red tape and corruption, companies face government meddling, primarily in the form of a highly unpredictable tax-enforcement policy. The most battered victim is Yukos, the former Russian oil giant that is in its death throes after being hit with multibillion-dollar back-tax claims that its erstwhile owners say were part of a Kremlin campaign against them. A Moscow court last month sentenced Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the former Yukos chief executive and a major shareholder...
...vulnerable. Russian tax authorities recently slapped BP's joint oil venture in Russia, TNK-BP, with a $1 billion back-tax bill for 2001. The move has caused dismay at BP in London and prompted chief executive John Browne to visit Moscow last month, where he met with Putin. The Russian leader reassured Browne, "We were not mistaken when we supported your decision two years ago" and praised the company for being "a good corporate citizen." Meanwhile, the Japanese tobacco company JTI, which makes Winston and Camel brands at a $400 million state-of-the-art factory it built...
...greatest dangers? Christopher Weafer, chief strategist at Alfa Bank in Moscow, expresses caution about the energy sector and other areas that could be construed by the Kremlin as being of strategic value. A lack of legal enforcement of ownership rights makes investments in those areas particularly vulnerable. "Putin will have to follow through on his promise to end some of the unsettling actions that are driving capital flight and blocking investment," says Weafer. According to Russia's Central Bank, capital flight quadrupled last year, to $9.4 billion. But for now, Western companies seem eager to keep on buying...
...state industries were privatized after the collapse of the Soviet Union; on charges including tax evasion and fraud; in Moscow. The conviction ended a long trial that critics claimed was part of a politically motivated campaign by the Kremlin to deter the billionaire from financing opposition to Vladimir Putin and discourage independent business. Khodorkovsky, whose now-dwindled fortune was once estimated at $15 billion, was sentenced to nine years in prison, which will remove him from the scene well past Russia's 2008 national election...