YUKOS
YUKOS (Ю́КОС) is a petroleum company in Russia, controlled by Russian billionaire Mikhail Khodorkovsky and a number of prominent Russian businessmen.Yukos is one of the world's largest non-state oil companies. It was acquired in controversial circumstances from the Russian Government during the privatization process of the early 1990s.
In April 2003, Yukos agreed to a merger with Sibneft, but the merger was soon undone in the aftermath of the arrest of Yukos CEO Khodorkovsky in October, 2003.
The high-profile arrest of Khodorkovsky is widely believed to have been due his activism in the Russian political process. Shortly thereafter, on October 31, the Russian government froze ownership of 44% of the companies shares. The reason given was to prevent them from them being sold by a group of major shareholders led by Khodorkovsky.
Recently in July, Yukos has been charged with federal charges that concist in amounts over 7 billion dollars for the concept of tax evading. Apparently the charges has been accepted by the company and in order to prevent bankrupcy its directive have made a friendly offer to the government which consists in paying 8 billion dollars in a period of three years.