MOSCOW, June 8 (RIA Novosti) Energy resources era in global politics/Kremlin gives Blair a chance to leave honorably/Samsung Electronics to build first plant in Russia/TNK-BP allocates nearly $4 billion to buy new licenses/Central Bank imposes sanctions on foreign bank subsidiary
Rossiiskaya Gazeta
Energy resources era in global politics
The G8 summit in Heiligendamm, Germany, will be the last high-level meeting Russian President Vladimir Putin will attend, a German political analyst told the Russian government's daily.
According to Alexander Rahr, an expert with the German Council for Foreign Policies, Putin will most likely repeat in Heiligendamm the ideas he voiced at the previous, St. Petersburg, summit last summer.
It is the idea of a new Energy Charter that would respect the interests of producer, consumer and transit countries alike.
Rahr believes that the West is not prepared to accept the Russian version of a new energy strategy. The G8 countries differ too much on the issue, he said, but it could still be discussed at next year's summit.
The West knows that this is a new era in global politics, an era of energy resources. The political role of producing countries has grown substantially over the last 30 years, which means that the issue of energy security will be at the top of the agenda of the next G8 summits, Rahr said.
Moscow hopes to be made responsible for implementing common decisions made at the G8 summit, and may also advocate admitting China to the group in the next few years.
So far, the West is not prepared to see Beijing in its narrow circle, because that would complicate the situation, the German analyst writes, primarily because Russia and China, two major powers, do not fully accept Western liberal values.
However, it is apparent that China, Brazil and India will join the group, and then the organization will not only work to promote its values, but will also be guided by global political and economic interests.
Nezavisimaya Gazeta
Kremlin gives Blair a chance to leave honorably
British Prime Minister Tony Blair intends to use his last foreign appearance before he leaves office to present a Western ultimatum to President Vladimir Putin.
During the G8 summit in Heiligendamm, Germany, he will reportedly warn the Russian leader that foreign investment in Russia will stop and European companies will withdraw unless Moscow stops retreating from democratic values.
It is rumored that the British Prime Minister will also move to curtail the interest of British business in Russia.
Although Blair and his aides have referred to the opinion of Europe, their criticisms of Russian policy sound very much like statements recently made in Washington.
President George W. Bush has said that the Kremlin was moving away from democratic reforms, and spokesmen for the U.S. secret services complained about the activity of Russian intelligence in the United States.
The policy of pressuring Moscow has apparently been coordinated during Blair's recent visit to Washington.
Since the British premier is leaving his post June 27, his meeting with Putin will be his "swan song," but a song that might have a long echo.
The Kremlin is underestimating the effect its actions and statements have on the Western public.
The West has noticed Russia's conflicts with major British companies, compounded with criticism of the British authorities, which were accused of "silly behavior" in the Litvinenko affair.
Likewise, Moscow cannot expect the West to react positively to the protest actions at the Estonian Embassy or the recent statements about "new [missile] targets in Europe."
By acting in this way, the Kremlin is fanning an anti-Russian hysteria in the Western media more effectively than its most die-hard critics.
Moscow's hopes that some Western leaders and the public will keep silent for fear of losing lucrative Russian contracts have not materialized.
Besides, the example of Tony Blair has shown that the Kremlin's sympathy for Western leaders can run dry overnight.
Vedomosti
Samsung Electronics to build first plant in Russia
On Saturday, South Korea and Russia will sign an agreement allowing leading appliance maker Samsung Electronics to build a plant in an industrial area on the border between the Kaluga and Moscow regions in central Russia.
The $100 million plant, which will produce LCD and plasma panels, is scheduled to open in 2008 or early 2009.
A senior official with the Kaluga regional administration said the agreement would not stipulate the new enterprise's production capacity, as all forms and records "are currently being finalized."
Kirill Novikov, general director of Expert-Retail chain, said the intention of Samsung Electronics to produce more LCD and plasma panels in Russia is quite logical. LCD and plasma television sets are among the few growing segments of the stagnant home-appliance market.
A spokesperson for the Telebalt TV plant in Kaliningrad, the Russian enclave on the Baltic coast, that makes about a million picture-tube LCD and plasma TV sets a year, said annual production at the new enterprise must total at least 1.5 million TV sets in order to make a profit.
Nadezhda Senyuk, public relations director at the Tekhnosila home-appliance store chain, said picture-tube TV sets are becoming obsolete due to cheaper LCD and plasma panels, which will be in high demand. LCD TV sets, which cost 55,000 to 60,000 rubles ($2,000 to $2,500) two years ago, now sell for only about 30,000 rubles ($1,500).
GfK Group, the No. 4 market research organization worldwide, said Samsung Electronics controlled 20.4% of the Russian LCD TV market last fall, followed by Philips, Sharp, Sony, Toshiba and LG with 19.4%, 14.2%, 8.8%, 8.5% and 7.9%, respectively.
Kommersant
TNK-BP allocates nearly $4 billion to buy new licenses
Russian-British joint venture TNK-BP has ambitious plans to buy new fields. At the TNK-BP Holding's shareholders meeting due July 15, they are invited to approve a loan of 100 billion rubles ($3.87 billion) to its subsidiary Vanyoganneft for the purchase of licenses.
The sector's experts are sure it is just a declaration of intent. Whether TNK-BP will be able to implement its plans or not will largely depend on the government's attitude to it.
TNK-BP has declined to specify which mineral resource areas and when it would like to buy.
The Ministry of Natural Resources says the Federal Agency for Subsoil Use (Rosnedra) raised slightly over 50 billion rubles ($1.93 billion) from the sale of licenses last year. The funds were received from the sale of hydrocarbon deposits and other mineral resources, including medicinal mud.
"The company's resource base has been depleted and there are few new large projects, except the Uvatskoye project and the Verkhnechonskoye field [East Siberia]," said Valery Nesterov, an analyst with the Troika Dialog investment company.
His estimates show that oil companies spent a total of $3.3 billion on licenses over the past two years, which is less than TNK-BP wants to give to its subsidiary.
According to TNK-BP's data, its total reserves (by SPE standards) amounted to 1.19 billion metric tons of oil equivalent as of December 31, 2006. Last year, it acquired 17 new exploration and production licenses.
"The declared sum shows the seriousness of the company's intentions," Nesterov said. "This is a sort of pressure on the rival, evidence of the fact that the company intends to compete for resources. However, TNK-BP is in for tough competition," he added.
Russian state-run company Rosneft has been a very active bidder at auctions of late.
"Rosneft substantially overpays for resources against the starting price," said Konstantin Batunin, an analyst with Alfa-Bank. One of Rosneft's most expensive transactions was the purchase of a license for the Eastern Sugdinskoye field for $260 million, which had a starting price of $10 million.
With state-run companies being so active, the sector's experts are convinced that TNK-BP, which has foreign companies among its shareholders, will not be able to buy strategic deposits with reserves exceeding 70 million metric tons.
However, if Gazprom becomes TNK-BP's co-owner, the monopoly will decide for itself how much and for what to pay, said Andrei Gromadin, an analyst with MDM-Bank.
Vremya Novostei
Central Bank imposes sanctions on foreign bank subsidiary
Swedbank Russia, a subsidiary of the Swedish financial group, officially announced Thursday that Russia's Central Bank had imposed sanctions against it for violating money-laundering rules.
The Russian banking community said it was the first instance of serious restrictions imposed on a structure of an international financial group.
Swedbank Russia is among the world's top 100 lenders. Its main business has until now been to serve companies, but now the bank is offering services to individuals. In Russia, Swedbank has three offices - in Moscow, St. Petersburg and Kaliningrad. In seven years' time it is planning to increase that number to 100.
On Thursday, Russian bankers expressed great surprise at the precedent - usually foreign banks try to hedge themselves against money laundering.
"This is a great blow to a foreign bank's reputation," said Richard Hainsworth, general director of the rating agency RusRating.
"This is the first instance of this happening to a subsidiary of a large transnational corporation," said Alexei Kogorev, head of interbank market risks at Promsvyazbank.
"To judge from the list of don'ts, the bank has been banned from carrying out most of its operations. If it were a Russian bank, the ban would overwhelmingly mean the recall of its license," he said.
He added that, typically, bans on corresponding account transactions also involve the bank's corresponding account with the Central Bank, which practically rules out any possibility of payments.
Mikhail Matovnikov, general director of the Center for Economic Analysis, puts the rather harsh decision by the regulator down to the fact that it could not be the first instance of violation by the bank.
"Perhaps the investigation was begun more than a month ago. Foreign bank subsidiaries are usually slow to make decisions," he said.
But he said it was unlikely that the violations were serious or would result in the withdrawal of the license.
He is echoed by Andrei Melnikov, deputy general director of the Deposit Insurance Agency: "Such warnings by the regulator seldom, if ever, end in the recall of the license."
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