  ojsc "yukos oil company" (, ) was an oil and gas company based in moscow, russia. yukos was acquired from the russian government by russian oligarch mikhail khodorkovsky's bank menatep during the controversial "loans for shares" auctions of the mid 1990s. between 1996 and 2003 yukos became one of the biggest and most successful russian companies, producing 20% of russia's oil output, as much as libya or iraq, and khodorkovsky became an advocate of democratization, international co-operation and russian reform. in october 2003 khodorkovsky - by then the richest man in russia and 16th richest man in the world - was arrested, and the company was forcibly broken up for alleged unpaid taxes shortly after and declared bankrupt in august 2006. courts in several countries later ruled that the real intent was to destroy yukos and obtain its assets for the government, and act politically against khodorkovsky. in 2014 the largest arbitration award in history, $50 billion (â¬37,2 billion), was won by yukos' former owners against russia.http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/07/28/us-russia-yukos-gml-iduskbn0fx0o620140728 from 2003-04 onwards, the russian government presented yukos with a series of tax claims totaling us$27&nbsp;billion(â¬20,1 billion). as the government froze yukos' assets at the same time, and alternative attempts to settle by yukos were refused, the company was unable to pay these tax demands. between 2004 and 2007, most of yukos's assets were seized and transferred for a fraction of the
Companies_disestablished_in_2007 Companies_established_in_1993 Companies_formerly_listed_on_the_London_Stock_Exchange European_Court_of_Human_Rights_cases_involving_Russia Oil_companies_of_Russia Yukos