Independent Court to the Rescue»

Russian authorities are now threatened with independent scrutiny of their high-profile investigations of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the oil tycoon, after his lawyers announced that the European Court of Human Rights had agreed to examine alleged judicial abuses.

Robert Amsterdam, Mr Khodorkovsky's Canadian lawyer, said that the Strasbourg court had agreed to study the cases of Mr Khodorkovsky, his business partner Platon Lebedev, and Alexei Pichugin, an employee of their company Yukos, all three of whom have been detained without trial in Moscow for several months.

The decision is likely to trigger fresh tensions between Russia and Europe, and bring back into the international spotlight a case that has raised widespread criticism of the administration of President Vladimir Putin and concern over democracy, property rights and foreign investment in the country.