Thursday, January 24, 2008

environmentalist or dictator?

Putin's Russia recently raised environmental concerns about an oil field development in eastern Russia to the tune of $20B in fines.

Since then, controlling interest in the project has been given to a Russian government-owned entity.

For some inexplicable reason, the environmental concerns and threats of fines have now suddenly disappeared.

Don't get me wrong, I have no love for multinationals or oil companies, and I don't particularly object to the idea of resources being nationalized. But this was highway robbery under a facade of environmentalism.

Putin just raised the cost of doing business in Russia again by adding to the fear that your investments could be stolen by the government at any moment.

No comments: