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By John Helmer, Moscow The bun has been in the oven for Victor Rashnikov for six months now. But did he go to President-elect Vladimir Putin and ask permission to put it there? It seems not. Has he been told to pull it out without burning everybody (except for the Australians)? Maybe. For the previous […]

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By John Helmer, Moscow Among Russians Egorova and Egorov are pretty common names, second only in circulation to Ivanova and Ivanov. That puts it up in the ranks of the Smiths and the Browns. If there really is a litigant named Elena Nikolaevna Egorova; if she owns a minuscule bloc of shares in Magnitogorsk Metallurgical […]

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By John Helmer, Moscow Why would Roman Abramovich and his pals decide to buy a small steelmaker in South Africa at a price that would add to their debt by the very same amount they offloaded last year on to share buyers, so as to keep their debt-to-earnings ratio down, and their bankers sweet? That’s […]

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By John Helmer, Moscow On October 12, 2004, Sergei Frank, a former federal Minister of Transport, was appointed chief executive of Sovcomflot, Russia’s largest oil tanker company and one of the top five in the world. Frank confirmed, said the company on its website, “that the Company’s management will take all necessary steps to enhance […]

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By John Helmer, Moscow Rupert Murdoch has produced this week an item for the clinical casebook on the brain-challenged. The criminal investigations now under way against him, his son James, his senior executives at News Corporation, company lawyers, and hired hands in the UK, the US and Australia are, he tweeted, nothing more than “every […]