Former Yukos chief Mikhail Khodorkovsky on Wednesday continued his testimony, detailing what happened to the oil giant's crude and profits from 1998 to 2003.
Khodorkovsky and his former business partner Platon Lebedev, who were sentenced to eight-year sentences for tax evasion and fraud in 2005, are on trial again for allegedly stealing more than 892 billion rubles ($30.4 billion) in oil.
Prosecutors say they stole 350 million metric tons of fuel from Yukos subsidiaries during the period in question, while also laundering 487 billion rubles ($16.6 billion) and $7.5 billion. If convicted, they face 22 1/2 years in prison.
On Wednesday, Khodorkovsky again dismissed the allegations as fabricated and illogical.
"The very fact that oil disappeared from … [producing subsidiaries] was thought up by unprincipled investigators from start to finish, without any statement from anyone that it happened, and therefore, without any sort of verification," Khodorkovsky said.
He said earlier that any disappearance would have been indicated in the companies' annual inventory checks, but that there were no such documents.
All of the oil was pumped into state-run Transneft's pipelines, he said.
Khodorkovsky also detailed how Yukos spent its $16 billion in profit during the period. Almost $6.7 billion went to the purchase of Sibneft, while $2 billion was spent on other acquisitions. Yukos paid $2.6 billion in dividends and $506 million to consolidate subsidiaries.
The remaining $5 billion was capital investment, he said, which helped Yukos double output to 80 million tons per year.
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