Russia Places Billionaire Evtushenkov Under House Arrest

Billionaire Vladimir Evtushenkov, the richest Russian to face criminal charges since Mikhail Khodorkovsky, was placed under house arrest yesterday on suspicion of money laundering. The accusations stem from a probe into the alleged theft of shares in oil assets in Russia’s Bashkortostan region in which Evtushenkov’s AFK Sistema acquired full control in 2009, according to the Investigative Committee. Sistema said the accusations were “completely groundless” and vowed to use all possible legal means to make their case. Khodorkovsky, released in December after a decade in prison, said OAO Rosneft Chief Executive Officer Igor Sechin, a long-time ally of President Vladimir Putin, may have engineered the arrest to pressure Evtushenkov into selling his oil company, OAO Bashneft, Vedomosti newspaper reported. Rosneft isn’t interested in Bashneft, and Khodorkovsky’s comments aren’t true, Mikhail Leontyev, a spokesman for the state-run company, said by phone today. Khodorkovsky has accused Sechin of orchestrating his own arrest and the dismantling of his Yukos Oil Co., most of which Rosneft later acquired, a claim Rosneft has denied. Evtushenkov has a fortune estimated at $6.9 billion, making him the 19th richest Russian on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, largely from oil producer Bashneft and OAO Mobile TeleSystems, the biggest mobile operator in Russia. Khodorkovsky was Russia’s richest man at the time of his arrest in 2003.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-09-16/russia-places-billionaire-evtushenkov-under-house-arrest.html