PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE TO INVESTIGATE PRIVATIZATION PROCESS.

In what is being seen as the most serious threat to privatization so far, the office of the Russian procurator general announced yesterday that it will conduct an "intensive" investigation of the privatization of several of Russia’s largest industrial enterprises. Those enterprises include Norilsk Nickel — Russia’s largest producer of nickel, copper, cobalt and platinoids — whose incumbent board of directors is fiercely resisting the government’s sale last December of a controlling share in the enterprise to Oneximbank. (8) Procurator General Yuri Skuratov predicted that his office’s investigation of the second, or "monetary," phase of privatization would result in criminal charges.

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