By John Helmer, Moscow Nathaniel Rothschild (right, pointing) has told the UK High Court that a London newspaper report claiming he had tried ingratiating himself with Oleg Deripaska (centre) was defamatory, and that as a result of the publication he had been “seriously damaged in his character and reputation and has suffered considerable distress, embarrassment […]

by John Helmer - Sunday, December 18th, 2011
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By John Helmer, Moscow Investbank, the Russian banking group which was formerly the property of Vladimir Antonov, was asked to clarify its position in relation to the charges now pending against Antonov in Lithuania; the extradition case under way in London; and balance-sheet examinations of banks associated with Antonov in Lithuania, Latvia, and elsewhere. Here […]

by John Helmer - Tuesday, December 13th, 2011
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By John Helmer, Moscow While Boris Berezovsky, Roman Abramovich and Oleg Deripaska are hard at work changing the British courts’ interpretation of the law on corruption, Vladimir Antonov has come along to challenge the British law on asylum and extradition. Antonov, along with his Lithuanian partner Raimondas Baranauskas, were arrested in London on November 23, […]

by John Helmer - Monday, December 12th, 2011
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By John Helmer, Moscow The relationship between taste and power is what Karl Marx would have called dialectical; for today’s Russian oligarchs that’s a red flag – in the race track, not the Marxist sense of the term. The oligarchs don’t mind showing off their taste in foreign places and foreign newspapers; inside Russia they […]

by John Helmer - Wednesday, December 7th, 2011
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By John Helmer, Moscow Oleg Deripaska demanded, and received from Roman Abramovich, a warranty that in his takeover of Rusal shares, he wasn’t buying stolen goods. Testimony by Deripaska’s London lawyer, Paul Hauser, followed in the UK High Court last week with details which Deripaska himself claimed in his testimony he couldn’t remember at all. […]

by John Helmer - Monday, November 28th, 2011
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By John Helmer, Moscow Prime Minister Vladimir Putin recently conceded that the oligarchs who were running Russia behind the shaking hand and raddled brain of Boris Yeltsin had caused such chaos, Putin was obliged to use what he called “manual control” to recover the country. The evidence given last week in the UK High Court […]

by John Helmer - Monday, November 21st, 2011
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By John Helmer, Moscow Oleg Deripaska has made his debut in the witness-box of the UK High Court, testifying for almost three hours on Friday afternoon, after being called as a witness by Roman Abramovich against the claims of Boris Berezovsky. So precise and painstaking were Deripaska’s responses to some of the questions asked by […]

by John Helmer - Friday, November 18th, 2011
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Q [Laurence Rabinowitz for Boris Berezovsky] Mr Abramovich, in the course of that answer you said when you visited him — talking about Mr Patarkatsishvili — in February [2003], you told him that you were selling [Rusal] because Oleg [Deripaska] was trying to squeeze you out. Is that now your evidence?

by John Helmer - Monday, November 14th, 2011
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By John Helmer, Moscow Is Vladimir Kekhman going to lose his bananas because the Joint Fruit Company (JFC) he owns, Russia’s banana trade leader, cannot, or will not, pay $16.2 million in commercial damages awarded since August by the UK High Court in London? Kekhman, who doubles as director of the Mikhailovsky Theatre in St. […]

by John Helmer - Friday, November 11th, 2011
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By John Helmer, Moscow An unusual moment occurred on Wednesday this week in Roman Abramovich’s testimony in the UK High Court when he refers to the seigneurial right – that historically doubtful power a feudal lord claimed for first sex with young virgins on his estates, who were, by feudal law, his property. Abramovich says: […]

by John Helmer - Thursday, November 10th, 2011
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