Law & order

 

Weaponized courts: The $50 bn Yukos case may be the final straw for Russia, ending its cooperation with Western ‘justice’

Given the torrent of anti-Russian sentiment in the West, it’s unlikely Moscow would get a fair hearing in legal proceedings overseen by Western courts. And recent hints suggest three decades of engagement may be coming to an end.

A Dutch court has just reversed another earlier Dutch court ruling that reversed an even earlier Dutch court ruling. Russia had been sued by a company representing the shareholders of erstwhile oil giant Yukos. The latest iteration, reversing the reversal and taking us back to the original judgment, demands that Russia pay $50 billion to its shareholders. Yukos was nationalized in the early 2000s, on the grounds of failure to pay tax arrears after the arrest of its CEO for tax evasion.

So, what should Moscow do? It has appealed, but perhaps it should think about whether it still wants to play the game.

Let’s look at the behavior of other Dutch courts. In 2001, Slobodan Milošević appeared at the Hague charged with crimes against humanity, genocide – the full package. And, quite rightly, said most Westerners, because had not their media already named him the “butcher of the Balkans”?