Former oil tycoon Leonid Nevzlin, convicted in absentia of murder in Russia in what he termed a show trial, has bought a 20 percent stake in Israel's Haaretz newspaper, the left-wing daily said Sunday. Nevzlin immigrated in 2003 to Israel, which has turned down Russian requests to extradite him. He was once a major shareholder in Yukos and a close adviser to its jailed chief, Mikhail Khodorkovsky.
Haaretz said Nevzlin would pay 140 million shekels ($41 million) for the 20 percent holding in Haaretz. In 2008, the Moscow City Court found Nevzlin guilty of organizing five murders, including the killing of a local mayor where the oil firm's biggest production unity was based. He denied the charges, saying in a statement he was the victim of "a show trial managed under the supervision of the Kremlin," and appealed to the European Court of Human Rights.
(Reuters)
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