Former Russian oil tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky has been granted a one-year residence permit by Switzerland, a Swiss migration official said Sunday.
Former CEO of oil giant Yukos and an outspoken critic of President Vladimir Putin, Khodorkovsky was granted permission last Thursday to reside in the northeastern canton of St. Gallen, where his wife and children are already located, Federal Migration Office press secretary Martin Reichlin told Itar-Tass.
The former Yukos head, once the richest man in Russia, served 10 years in prison after being found guilty of fraud in a case that many believe to be politically motivated. Khodorkovsky was released after a surprise announcement by Putin in December that accompanied an amnesty in honor of the 20th anniversary of the Russian constitution.
The businessman flew directly to Berlin after his release to visit his ill mother, but moved to Switzerland on a three-month Schengen visa shortly afterward.
He has remained critical of the Kremlin after his time in prison and earlier this month gave speeches at Kiev's Independence Square and Kiev Polytechnic Institute in which he said that Russia had been involved in the violence against protesters at demonstrations that eventually ousted pro-Russian Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych.
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