From the Sunday Herald:

A symbol of selective Kremlin justice, his second trial – on embezzlement and money-laundering charges – promises to reveal whether Russia is really headed in a new direction. Does Medvedev really represent a loosening of the country’s soft authoritarianism, as liberals hope? Or is it business as usual, with Prime Minister Vladimir Putin and a tight circle of Kremlin hawks pulling the strings? The Khodorkovsky Show, as it’s being called, should provide some answers.

The bespectacled businessman’s fall from grace was precipitous. In better times he was Russia’s richest man, worth an estimated $15 billion. He ran and owned most of its biggest oil company, Yukos, and was the most successful of all the oligarchs – the sharp-elbowed businessmen who made their fortunes in the 1990s.