Just came across this breaking blurb in the FT … more comments forthcoming:
The Tories are cultivating private relations with Gazprom, the Russian gas monopoly, despite David Cameron’s tough public stance on the country’s invasion of Georgia, Alan Duncan, the shadow business secretary, has revealed . Mr Duncan said it would be a mistake to treat the company as a “pariah”. He revealed that he visited Gazprom this month for the third time, in a bid to build a relationship. “It’s better to have a scratchy relationship with Russia and hence Gazprom than none at all and … such relationships could probably be more easily built up in opposition than in government,” he stated.