Alexander Temerko, a friend of Boris Johnson with connections to the highest level of the Kremlin, has donated over £1m to the Conservative Party, writes

President Vladimir Putin said today that Russia faces unfair criticism and needless military threats from the West, lashing out in an annual news conference at US plans for missile defence sites in former Soviet satellite states and at suspicions that Moscow is wielding its energy wealth for political purposes.

Russia's top prosecutor said his office wants to question fugitive tycoon Boris Berezovsky the probe of ex-security agent Alexander Litvinenko's poisoning death, Russian news agencies reported today.

The owners of the holding company that controls Russia’s largest oil company Yukos, have offered their stock to the government in exchange for the release of former Yukos chief executive Mikhail Khodorkovsky.

First deputy to Russia's General Prosecutor, Yuri Biryuk, has said that Russia has issued an international arrest warrant for ten directors and owners of embattled oil company AO Yukos.