The robbers' most fervent wish is to become barons. Their erstwhile,
less exalted, criminal friends are on the way. Expect a bloodbath, a
genuine mafia gangland war over territory and spoils. The result is by
no means guaranteed.
The Energy Sector
The pension fund of the Russian oil giant, Lukoil, a minority
shareholder in TV-6 (owned by a discredited and self-exiled Yeltsin-era
oligarch, Boris Berezovsky), this week forced the closure of this
television station on legal grounds. Gazprom (Russia's natural gas
monopoly) has done the same to another television station, NTV, last
year (and then proceeded to expropriate it from its owner, Vladimir
Gusinsky).
Gazprom is forced to sell natural gas to Russian consumers at 10% the
world price and to turn a blind eye to debts owed it by Kremlin
favorites.
Both Lukoil and Gazprom are, therefore, used by the Kremlin as
instruments of domestic policy.
But Russian energy companies are also used as instruments of foreign
policy.
A few examples:
Russia has resumed oil drilling and exploration in war ravaged
Chechnya.
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