| 英國倫敦一處高檔街區不久前上演一出好戲，俄羅斯巨富、切爾西足球俱樂部老板羅曼?阿布拉莫維奇和流亡英國的俄羅斯寡頭鮑里斯?別列佐夫斯基狹路相逢，后者為把索賠案傳票交給前者，已整整尋覓了6個月。兩人結怨已久，未經交談，各自保鏢已對戰。英國《每日郵報》評論說：“這一場景讓人想到黑幫電影。” |
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Roman Abramovich vs Boris Berezovsky.[File Photo/ABC News]
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Roman Abramovich, the billionaire owner of Chelsea football club, not even a luxury goods store in London's exclusive Knightsbridge district is a refuge from the rough and tumble of Russian business.
Abramovich was shopping in the area when rival Russian tycoon Boris Berezovsky spotted him and charged over to serve him with a writ, Berezovsky told Reuters on Monday.
It was thousands of miles from the Siberian oilfields the two men are fighting over, but they were drawn together by their love of the finer things in life: Abramovich was in a Hermes luxury goods shop, and Berezovsky was in Dolce & Gabbana.
"I was buying presents in Sloane Street and when I left the Dolce & Gabbana, my bodyguards said Abramovich was in Hermes which is just next door to Dolce & Gabbana," Berezovsky told Reuters by telephone from London.
"When he saw me, Abramovich tried to hide behind his bodyguards," he said. "I threw it at his feet and told him I was serving him the writ, and then I turned around and left the shop."
A spokesman for Abramovich declined to comment on the incident or the dispute over Russian assets.
Berezovsky, once one of Russia's most influential men, fled Russia in 2000 after falling out of favor with President Vladimir Putin.
He has become one of Putin's fiercest critics from his base in London, where he was granted political asylum in 2003.
Abramovich is governor of Russia's remote Chukotka region, near Alaska, but has been spending much of his time in Britain since selling some of his biggest assets in Russia and buying the fashionable Chelsea soccer club in 2003.
Berezovsky said the writ outlined his claims against Abramovich over billions of dollars worth of stakes in oil company Sibneft, metals giant RUSAL and television station ORT.
Berezovsky said that after he fell out with Putin, Abramovich, acting for the Kremlin, had taken control of the stakes.
Berezovsky said his case against Abramovich was under British jurisdiction and the matter can formally enter the legal system now the writ had been served. Berezovsky had the writ in his car because he had been trying to serve it for some time.
"I understand that readers are happy to read that the battle is going on in boutiques but it is actually much more serious," Berezovsky told Reuters.
"It looks like a story about boutiques but it is a story about peoples' lives."
Gas giant Gazprom bought Sibneft in 2005 for more than $13 billion from Millhouse Capital, Abramovich's investment vehicle.
RUSAL was merged in 2007 into United Company RUSAL, the world's largest primary aluminium producer, which is 66-percent controlled by tycoon Oleg Deripaska.
(Agencies)
Vocabulary:
Roman Abramovich：羅曼?阿布拉莫維奇，俄羅斯寡頭，英國切爾西足球俱樂部老板。2005年3月根據福布斯雜志統計他的資產約有133億美金，是俄羅斯首富及全世界排名第21位的富豪。
Boris Berezovsky：鮑里斯?別列佐夫斯基，俄羅斯寡頭，集數學家、金融家、媒體大亨和“政壇鬼才”各種身份于一身。
writ：法院傳票
fall out：爭吵，鬧翻
political asylum：政治庇護
jurisdiction：管轄權，根據英國法律規定，英格蘭法院在判斷自己是否應對某一案件行使管轄權時，關注的是被告的過境出現。例如，某一當事人即使只在倫敦機場過境停留幾個小時，只要在此期間法院的傳票被送到他手中，法院便可據此認為，對這一案件擁有管轄權。
（英語點津 Celene 編輯）
