Brazilian Court Seeks Berezovsky's Arrest

A court in Brazil has issued an arrest warrant for Boris Berezovsky, the British-based Kremlin critic, on charges of money laundering, Russian media reported today.

The warrant was issued yesterday by the federal court in Sao Paolo in a case involving the Media Sports Investment group (MSI), a sponsor of the Corinthians soccer club, said ITAR-TASS, the Russian state-owned news agency.

The case in Brazil dates back to 2004 when MSI spent millions of dollars acquiring new players.

"Who would invest this much money in a football team that has been in the red for years?" state prosecutor Jose Reinaldo Guimaraes Carneiro said when he started his investigation in February 2005. "And why?"

He said later in the year that the answers pointed to the Russian tycoon and money laundering.

In the summary of a 15-page report released after the investigation, Mr Carneiro said: "There is enough circumstantial evidence indicating that the MSI-Corinthians partnership is being used for the laundering of money, most of which was received from Boris Berezovsky, who is wanted (by Russian authorities) for crimes committed against the Russian financial system."

A separate trial in absentia against Mr Berezovsky opened yesterday in Moscow. The former oligarch, who fell out with the Kremlin and fled to Britain in 2000, is accused of embezzling millions of dollars from the state-controlled airline Aeroflot.

Mr Berezovsky said there had not been any contact between himself or his lawyers and the Brazilian authorities about the reported warrant, which he said was part of a politically motivated Kremlin push against him. He denied any involvement in money laundering. In a statement, he said: "Given the extensive comment in the Russian media and the farce of a trial in absentia in the Russian courts, I have no doubt that the Brazilian story is an extension of the Kremlin's politicized campaign against me."

Mr Berezovsky is also charged in Russia with conspiring to seize power. The charge is based on an interview he gave to the Guardian in April calling for a violent revolution in the country.