The second show trial of Mikhail Khodorkovsky on trumped up charges is one thing, but the worldwide legal assault on those in the Russian government who illegally stole his former company, Yukos, is an entirely different set of concerns for the kingmakers of the Kremlin.  According to this opinion column by Evgeny Kiselyov in the Moscow Times, certain unscrupulous individuals within the State do indeed have quite a lot to fear, as the chances for these multiple hundreds of billions in arbitration decisions linked to the Energy Charter Treaty are looking more and more likely.

The fact that Russia has hired the prominent law firm Cleary Gottlieb Steen & Hamilton to represent its interests at an annual cost totaling millions of dollars indicates that the Kremlin is very concerned about the case. At issue here is more than just the gigantic sum of the legal damages. The process could set an important precedent in the argument over whether Russia is obligated to obey the provisions of the Energy Charter Treaty that it signed in 1994 but never ratified.