Russian Tycoon Wants To Move To Ukraine

LONDON, England -- Russian tycoon Boris Berezovsky, a fierce critic of President Vladimir Putin, says he wants to leave Britain for Ukraine -- a move likely to ruffle the Kremlin leader’s feathers.

Russian tycoon Boris Berezovsky
Berezovsky, one of Russia’s once-mighty and hugely wealthy "oligarchs", told Reuters on Saturday the victory of Ukraine’s new President Viktor Yushchenko, a Western-leaning liberal whose candidacy Putin publicly opposed, had made up his mind.

"Yes, I want to go and live there with my family. And since it became a democratic country, there is no reason for me not to," Berezovsky, who was granted political asylum in Britain, said in an interview in London.

He said he had liked Britain during his three-and-a-half years in the country and added that he would seek new commercial opportunities in Ukraine, which neighbours Russia, once there.

"I do not have any business in Ukraine until now. Probably I will look for business there," he said.

A powerful Kremlin insider under ex-President Boris Yeltsin in the 1990s, Berezovsky lives in exile in London and wants to stir an opposition movement against Putin -- a man Berezovsky says he helped Yeltsin to pick as his successor.

Berezovsky said he would be making a preliminary trip to Kiev within a month to assess the practicalities of moving closer to Moscow.

"Kiev is very close to Moscow and if I miss something, most of all I miss snow!"

"RUSSIA WILL TRY TO GET ME"

He was confident Ukraine’s new leaders would not extradite him to Moscow, where he is wanted for fraud and embezzlement.

"I was granted political asylum according to the Geneva Convention. Many countries, including Ukraine, signed it and I am sure they will respect it.

"For sure, Russia will try to extradite, but I have already proved in court that everything Russia is trying to do against me is political. If Yushchenko is genuinely democratic, I have no doubt Russia will fail in its attempts to get me."

Yushchenko, at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, said he was unaware of Berezovsky’s aim. "One thing is sure. We will be acting in strict compliance with domestic and international laws ... in this context," he told reporters.

Yushchenko, elected in December, has pledged to work towards Ukraine’s greater integration with Western Europe while maintaining good ties with neighbouring Russia.

Putin had publicly backed his more pro-Moscow opponent in the election but later acknowledged Yushchenko’s victory.

Berezovsky sees Moscow’s campaign against him as part of Putin’s drive to subdue the "oligarchs" of the 1990s -- men who made fortunes in the privatisation of state assets after the collapse of the Soviet Union.

Ukraine’s Foreign Ministry said on Saturday he had not contacted it yet to pursue a visa, Interfax news agency said.

Source: Tiscali News