Tuesday, February 14, 2012

Russia

Yukos Has Yet to Pay $7 Billion In Back Taxes

13 October 2005 -- Russian bailiffs today said the troubled Yukos oil company has not yet paid $7 billion of its tax debts.

TEXT SIZE - +

October 13, 2005

Sergei Sazanov, deputy general director of the Federal Court Bailiff Service, said bailiffs have so far collected $14 billion.

Yukos has been assessed for a total of $28 billion in back taxes, fines, and penalties, though some of that amount remains to be upheld by courts.

Additionally, bailiffs this week announced that they had begun the process of executing a nearly $500 million claim against Yukos brought by Western creditor banks.

Yukos founder Mikhail Khodorkovskii was convicted of fraud and tax evasion and sentenced to eight years in prison. Observers said the case against Khodorkovskii was a Kremlin-inspired punishment for his political ambitions.

(AP)

For more news about events in Russia, see RFE/RL's webpage News and Features on Russia

Syrians in the northwestern town of Kfar Nubul pose with a cartoon depicting Russia

Angry Over Syria, Arab World Threatens Russian Boycott

Groups in a number of Arab states, angry over the Russian-Chinese veto of a UN resolution aimed at stopping the violence in Syria, have called for a one-day boycott of Russian and Chinese goods on February 12. More

Alla Dzhioyeva attends a protest by her supporters in Tskhinvali on January 28.

South Ossetian Opposition Leader Hospitalized After Raid

Alla Dzhioyeva, the opposition candidate whose victory in a runoff ballot in November for de facto president of Georgia's breakaway region of South Ossetia was swiftly annulled by the republic's Supreme Court, was taken to a hospital after a raid by some 200 masked security personnel on her headquarters in Tskhinvali. More

Protesters gather behind a banner reading "Honest Elections" during a demonstration in Moscow on February 4.

How To Rig An Election

A whistle-blower in Samara explains how the authorities fixed the Duma elections in December -- and plan to do the same in the presidential vote in March. More