Court's fillip for BP in Russia

A Russian court is likely to throw out a $2.8bn (£1.8bn) lawsuit against two BP executives on the board of the oil major's Russian joint venture, TNK-BP, after a judge denied plaintiffs more time to secure the necessary shareholder support.

Andrey Prokhorov, a minority shareholder in TNK-BP, had filed the lawsuit against Peter Charow and Richard Sloan, related to BP's failed attempts to sign a tie-up with state-controlled Rosneft, despite a previous commitment by BP to use TNK-BP as its main investment vehicle in Russia.

However, Russian law on joint-stock companies stipulates a plaintiff in such an action must own at least 1 per cent of the company's shares for the case to proceed.