Oligarch 'friends' Abramovich and Berezovsy square off in London court - The Australian

Billionaire Chelsea Football Club owner Roman Abramovich, centre, makes a rare public appearance as he leaves the court. Source: AP

Russian oligarch Boris Berezovsky, centre, leaves the High Court in London, with partner Yelena Gorbunova, left, and security guards. Source: AP

THE billionaire owner of Chelsea Football Club was accused yesterday of betraying the man who allegedly helped to build his fortune so that he could curry favour with Vladimir Putin.

Roman Abramovich, in a rare public appearance, listened as lawyers for Boris Berezovsky told the High Court in London that the Russian oligarch had taken advantage of his former mentor's fall from grace to enrich himself by bullying him out of billions of dollars worth of shares.

Mr Berezovsky, 65, is suing Mr Abramovich for more than $US6 billion ($6.3bn). He claims that he was intimidated by Mr Abramovich into selling his stake in Sibneft, an oil company, for far less than it was worth after being forced to flee Russia, having fallen out with the Kremlin.

The case, which has been through four years of preliminary skirmishes, is one of the biggest trials to have come before the English courts. Insiders claim that it will put the publicity-shy Mr Abramovich's business dealings under uncomfortable scrutiny and expose his ties with the Kremlin.

Yet the dispute is at its heart an intensely personal one, Laurence Rabinowitz, QC, for Mr Berezovsky, told the court as he opened the case yesterday. "At its bottom, this is a case about two men who worked together to acquire an asset that would make them wealthy beyond the wildest dreams of most people and who in the process became and remained good friends," Mr Rabinowitz said.

"Until, that is, Mr Berezovsky fell out with those in power in the Kremlin and was forced to leave his home and create a new life abroad."

The rift between the two oligarchs was evident as their armies of lawyers and hangers-on set up on opposite sides of the crowded court yesterday.

Mr Abramovich, 44, listened through headphones to the Russian translation. He seemed relaxed but attentive, staying for the full day and giving close scrutiny to documents that were put forward in evidence by Mr Rabinowitz. However, he spoke little.

Mr Berezovsky was more chipper and conferred frequently with his aides as Mr Rabinowitz outlined his case. He later left flanked by his bodyguards and drove away in a black Range Rover.

The relationship between the two oligarchs dates back to the early 1990s, in the chaos of post-Soviet Russia, when a handful of businessmen quickly amassed spectacular fortunes. Mr Berezovsky, the son of Jewish intellectuals, rose to become the most influential of the oligarchs in the mid-1990s, with close ties to Boris Yeltsin's regime and control of one of Russia's most influential television stations. He fell out with Mr Putin and fled Russian in 2000, later claiming exile in Britain.

Diminished by years of legal bills, security costs and an expensive divorce, Mr Berezovsky's net wealth has fallen to ?470 million, according to the Sunday Times Rich List. Mr Abramovich is said to be worth ?10.3billion.

The gulf in their respective fortunes is largely because Mr Abramovich took advantage of his friend's fall from grace, Mr Berezovsky argues. Mr Abramovich was faced with a choice, he said: remain loyal to the friend who had helped to build his fortune and risk the wrath of the Kremlin, or seek to profit from Mr Berezovsky's troubles. "It is our case that Mr Abramovich demonstrated that he was a man to whom wealth and influence mattered more than friendship and loyalty."

Mr Berezovsky claims that Mr Abramovich coerced him into selling his 21.5 per cent stake in Sibneft, which was created through the privatisation of Russia's oil infrastructure, for only $US1.3 billion, when it was worth up to $6 billion. He claims that Mr Abramovich threatened that his assets would be seized by the Kremlin and his friends in Russia would be in danger if he did not sell the shares for less than they were worth.

This is denied by Mr Abramovich, who argues that they were never business partners.

The trial is expected to last three months.