Judge Orders Halt to YUKOS Unit Auction

[Tab]

HOUSTON (Reuters) - A U.S. bankruptcy court on Thursday stepped into the ongoing battle between YUKOS YUKO.RTS and the Russian government, issuing an order to block the impending auction of the company's main oil-producing arm.

The auction of YUKOS' Yuganskneftegaz subsidiary, planned for Sunday, was ordered by Russian authorities in the dispute over $27.5 billion in taxes that the Russian government says are owed by YUKOS.

U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Letitia Clark excluded the Russian government from her temporary restraining order, limiting it to Russian natural gas monopoly Gazprom GAZPPE.RTS, which was expected to win the auction, and the banks that were to finance the purchase.

"Participants in international commerce, in Russia, in the United States and elsewhere, need to have an expectation that when they invest in foreign enterprises they may do so without fear that their investments may be the subject of confiscatory action by agencies of the foreign government," Clark wrote in her ruling.
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&ncid=749&e=1&u=/nm/20041217/bs_nm/yukos_bankruptcy_dc

[Hard Attack]

1. Its only a matter of time before Russia says F*Ck OFF!

[Mokito]

3. And that time is NOW!

Russia to push on with Yukos sale

Yukos has won the injunction, but the auction looks set to go ahead
Russia has said it will auction off a key production unit of embattled oil company Yukos as planned this weekend despite a US court injunction.
Authorities aim to sell Yuganskneftegas on Sunday, 19 December, to pay Yukos' $27.5bn (£14.2bn) tax bill.

On Thursday, a US bankruptcy judge granted a temporary injunction blocking the Yuganskneftegas sale.

But Russian officials said the Houston court had no jurisdiction in the case and called the ploy a "nonsense".

BBC World

[daleo]

2. Where does the effect of the U.S. invasion of Iraq fit in here?

"Participants in international commerce, in Russia, in the United States and elsewhere, need to have an expectation that when they invest in foreign enterprises they may do so without fear that their investments may be the subject of confiscatory action by agencies of the foreign government," Clark wrote in her ruling.

There are few actions quite as "confiscatory" as the illegal invasion of a foreign country.