The U.K. litigation of Boris Berezovsky and Roman Abramovich has been dubbed one of the biggest private court battles in human history. Boris Berezovsky, a Russian oligarch, claimed that Roman Abramovich, another Russian oligarch, cheated him out of more than USD5 billion. Roman Abramovich vehemently contested the allegations. The fortune of the 41-year-old Abramovich according to Forbes Magazine has been assessed at 12.1 billion British pounds, while the wealth of the 62-year-old Berezovsky was estimated at a relatively modest USD1.3 billion.

The Russian-U.S. Presidential Commission should become more effective, presidential aide Yuri Ushakov replied on December 9, 2012 to a question of whether the Commission had a future.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov and U.S. Acting Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Rose Gottemoeller met in Geneva on December 7, 2012 for consultations as the co-chairs of a taskforce for arms control and international security within the Russian-U.S. Presidential Commission.

The bill that will become Russia s response to the Magnitsky Act adopted in the United States could be signed into law by the Russian President before the end of the year, the First Deputy Chairman of the State Duma Foreign Affairs Committee Vyacheslav Nikonov told the Russia Today television station.

Russia s First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov said while visiting the New York Stock Exchange on December 5, 2012 that he expected that the friction forces created by the Magnitsky Act will not affect contacts between businessmen.

A possible change of government in Venezuela can complicate the situation for Russian companies working there, calling into question the implementation of joint contracts.

The production of metallurgy industry products and of finished metal products in January-September 2012 was 105.7 percent of the production level seen in January-September 2011.

Russia s Economic Development Ministry and the U.S. Commerce Department on November 30 signed a protocol to amend an agreement to halt an anti-dumping probe against certain types of hot-rolled steel products from Russia that the two countries signed on July 12, 1999, a Ministry official said.

The power consumption of the Russian economy, expressed in tons of oil equivalent per capita, and is generally comparable to the power use in France, Germany, and the U.S.

Mobile TeleSystems will not begin selling Apple s iPhone five in its retail chain because the companies have not managed to come to terms on a new contract, a source familiar with the negotiations said.

The Okskaya Shipyard, based in Navashino, Nizhegorodskiy region, which is a member of Vladimir Lisin s UCL holding company, delivered to its customer Volga-Flot-Tanker the fifth vessel of the 10 project RST27 petroleum product tankers ordered, according to the Marine Engineering Bureau, the ship s developer.

Dmitry Peskov, President Vladimir Putin s spokesman, denied that there are any political underpinnings behind Russia s ban on meat imports from the United States.