They are accused of tax evasion and a number of other crimes. Seven of them are the heads of fictitious companies through which the sale of oil was simulated in order to evade taxes.

Earlier, Valery Lakhtin, representing the Prosecutor General's Office of the Russian Federation, said that the members of "an organized criminal group, led by Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the ex-head of YUKOS, are hiding from prosecution". In particular, he named Mr. Spirichev and another four people, as well as the leadership of YUKOS Universal Limited.

According to the Russian bureau of Interpol, documents and other materials connected with the cases of Nevzlin and Dubov were handed over by the Prosecutor General's Office of Russia on January 16, 2004. Both businessmen are currently in Israel.

According to unofficial reports, Leonid Nevzlin, during his time as a member of the Board of Directors of YUKOS and Senior Deputy Chairman of YUKOS Moscow, helped siphon off the bulk of the company's revenues to offshore bank accounts during 1999-2000. Mr. Nevzlin is accused of evading more than RUR 27.416m in taxes in 1999-2000.

Vladimir Dubov, the former member of the State Duma, is charged with stealing state funds allocated by the Volgograd region' authorities for the construction of homes for the military. Damage caused by his actions is estimated at 76bn of non-denominated rubles.

Another YUKOS shareholder, Mikhail Brudno, is accused of embezzling $2.8m from the state-owned company Apatit.

Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the former head of YUKOS, was arrested on October 25. The Prosecutor General's Office charged him with several counts. In particular, the businessman is accused of fraud (Article 159 of the Russian Criminal Code), non-compliance with a court judgment (Article 315), tax evasion (Articles 198 and 199), causing material damage by way of fraud and abuse of trust (Article 165) and document forgery (Article 327).