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Titans call Kremlin home

 Vladimir Putin has installed close confidants into the top jobs of major state-controlled companies. And that leaves many in the worlda little uncomfortable.

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published June 27, 2006

MOSCOW - When President Vladimir Putin calls a staff meeting, the heads of some of Russia's most prominent companies are at his beck and call.

Alongside his drive to re-establish Kremlin control over the nation's political life, Putin has aggressively reasserted state domination over major economic sectors - in part by installing members of his team, many dating back to his days in St. Petersburg, into key positions in some major state-controlled companies.

Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, a Putin protege, chairs the board of Gazprom, the world's largest gas company; a Kremlin deputy chief of staff, Igor Sechin, is chairman of the board of the Rosneft oil company, which is plotting a high-profile, $10-billion initial public offering on the London Stock Exchange this summer.

And Putin's chief of staff, Sergei Sobyanin, was named chairman of the nuclear fuel company TVEL, the springboard for what the Kremlin hopes will be a renaissance of the Russian nuclear industry.

The list of government officials doubling as captains of industry goes on, reflecting deeply intertwined state and business interests. Putin's influence in so many industries raises questions about whether politics won't trump economics in the end when business decisions are made.

It also means Russia is out of step in the Group of Eight, the elite economic club it's chairing this year. Russia's G-8 partners have expressed concern about the state's growing role, especially the Kremlin's influence in the volatile energy market, where many European countries fear they could become hostage to a Russian monopoly.

Putin has come under criticism from other G-8 leaders for the government-sanctioned carve-up of onetime tycoon Mikhail Khodorkovsky's Yukos oil company.

Khodorkovsky, who sponsored opposition parties in the run-up to parliamentary elections in 2003, now languishes in prison in Siberia, while the remnants of his company - once the nation's largest - is in receivership. Rosneft snapped up the choicest pieces after a murky state auction.

The Yukos example made clear how far the Kremlin is prepared to go to press Putin's campaign to tighten not just economic but political control in Russia, a topic that G-8 leaders are likely to raise - if gingerly - at next month's St. Petersburg summit.

Captains of industry

Dmitry Medvedev, 40: Putin's former presidential chief of staff, now deputy prime minister in charge of Russia's four priority national projects (boosting medical care, education, housing and agriculture) and a front-runner to be the Kremlin's pick to succeed Putin in 2008. A lawyer who worked with the St. Petersburg city government at the same time Putin was there. Headed Putin's campaign headquarters for his first presidential election in 2000. Considered a member of the liberal reformer wing of the Kremlin circle. Chairman of the board of directors of Gazprom, the world's biggest natural gas producer and exporter.

Igor Sechin, 45:Deputy chief of the Kremlin administration. A linguist who worked as a translator in Mozambique and served in Angola, then in the Russian armed forces. Russian media accuse him of being a former KGB agent, but that allegation is unproved. Worked with Putin in St. Petersburg city government. A member of the so-called "siloviki" faction, with close ties to military and security forces. Chairman of the board of directors of Rosneft, Russia's third-largest oil company, and widely considered to be the architect of the tax probe that brought down Mikhail Khodorkovsky and his Yukos oil company.

Viktor Ivanov, 56:Another deputy chief of staff, responsible for Kremlin personnel, and a former career KGB officer, including service in Afghanistan in the 1980s. Worked in St. Petersburg city government and in and out of the KGB's main successor, the Federal Security Service. Member of Siloviki. Chairs the boards of one of the biggest arms manufacturers, Almaz-Antei and the nation's flagship airline, Aeroflot.

Sergei Sobyanin, 48: Kremlin chief of staff. Lawyer, former apparatchik in the Young Communists' League, the Komsomol. Former chairman of Khanty-Mansiisk region and former governor of Tyumen region, both oil- and gas-rich Siberian territories. Chair of the nuclear fuel company TVEL, the springboard for the prospective renaissance of the nuclear industry.

[Last modified June 27, 2006, 01:14:35]