BERESOVSKI HARD TO GET WITHOUT FIRING A SHOT

Russua’s renowned entrepreneur Boris Berezovski has characterized attempts to pin the Aeroflot case on him as “political blackmail”, Radio Ekho Moskvy reports. This time, Mr. Berezovski was commenting on another summons to General Procurator’s Office where he is supposed to turn up on November 13th. In his words, he has “never had anything to do” with the Aeroflot case, because he has “not for a singly day worked for the Aeroflot and never been holder of the Aeroflot’s single share.” “I am ready to go to prison, since I am engaged in politics in Russia, when I am brought to justice for political clauses which, to my knowledge, are missing in today’s Criminal Code, where there are evident signs of a political case,” Mr. Berezovski is quoted as saying. Speaking of his likely arrival in Moscow for interrogation, he said he was “considering this question jointly with his lawyers.” Criminal proceedings were launched by the General Procurator’s Office against a number of former Aeroflot managers accused of illegal entrepreneurship and money laundering in 1999. Formal accusations were brought against the Aeorflot’s former director general deputies, Nikolai Glushkov and Aleksandr Krasnenker. Initially, Mr. Berezovski also was accused of wrong doing, but the charges were subsequently lifted from him. But he has been kept as witness since then. It looks like he is going to keep on being such for the time being. Anyway, whatever demonic properties are ascribed to baptized Jew Boris Abramovich Berezovski, his position concerning the Aeroflot case appears more intelligible than the rushabouts of the procurators. Moreover, after the General Procurator’s Office dismissed investigator Nikolai Volkov who had been in charge of the case, the story more a more reminds settling accounts with the unruly oligarch.